Track & Trace

Qu’il s’agisse d’utiliser la data à des fins de personnalisation, d’ouvrir de nouveaux canaux conversationnels ou bien de repenser sa stratégie d’e-merchandising, les défis sont nombreux pour le monde de la grande consommation ! Pour en discuter, le HUB Institute recevait lors de son HUBTALK Grande Consommation divers experts du sujet. Retour sur leurs interventions.

“Online self-service is an obvious way to relieve the pressure on contact centres and other frontline teams who are handling increasing volumes of customer queries now that less business is conducted face to face,” said Darren Jack, Technical Services Manager at Macro 4. “The key to doing this successfully is to make sure your self-service portal is easy to use, and gives customers fast access to the information they need, including all correspondence, and important documents such as orders, bills, statements, and so on.

Clinical trials are a fundamental tool used to evaluate the efficacy and safety of new drugs and medical devices and other health system interventions. The traditional clinical trials system acts as a quality funnel for the development and implementation of new drugs, devices and health system interventions. The concept of a “digital clinical trial” involves leveraging digital technology to improve participant access, engagement, trial-related measurements, and/or interventions, enable concealed randomized intervention allocation, and has the potential to transform clinical trials and to lower their cost.

Pharmaceutical companies might also make long-lasting adjustments to their supply chains, says David Simchi-Levi, who studies operations management at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge. Over the past few decades, drug makers have increasingly shifted their manufacturing away from the United States and Europe to countries such as India and China, which can produce the drugs at lower cost. But over the past few years, many firms have begun to look for ways to diversify their supplies of services and raw materials, to reduce the risk of supply interruptions in the event of a US–China trade war, says Simchi-Levi. The coronavirus outbreak could accelerate that trend. “Some shocks were anticipated, but not at this scale,” says Krofah. “This is going to cause a fundamental re-examination of that risk.”

The goal of the partnership is to identify ways technology can be used to help accelerate secure, information sharing between governments, healthcare providers, life science organizations and individuals. In so doing, Moderna and IBM seek to improve confidence in vaccine programs and increase rates of vaccination, thereby reducing community spread.

The drugmaker issued a voluntary recall of three lots of injectable phenylephrine hydrochloride, which is used to treat low blood pressure during anesthesia. The recall stemmed from a customer complaint of loose crimped vial overseals, which could result in a non-sterile product. Contamination of the IV drug could cause potentially fatal systemic infections, the company said in a recall announcement posted by the FDA on Thursday.
The possibility of a breach in sterility of the product, while remote, cannot be eliminated, the recall notice said. No adverse events associated with the issue have been reported to Sagent.

The Rondo Augmented Reality App merges the physical and digital worlds. The intelligent pharmaceutical packaging serves as a communication medium with the patients and offers them a gateway to valuable information and services of the digital world. Rondos App focuses on solutions that address patient needs and increase patient adherence. The app can be used for both clinical trials and commercial products.

Drug manufacturers, pharmacists, physicians and users already all benefit from integrated Smart Packaging. Thanks to NFC chips and RFID labelling tablet boxes and the like can be traced along the entire supply chain and improved digital tamper and product protection can be guaranteed. By incorporating innovative technologies such as the Internet of Things or Industry 4.0 service for users is also gradually improving. The communication between labels and smartphones, LED displays and audio packaging inserts provide patients with real-time information on drug dosage and administration. And smart packaging even automatically generates re-orders upon demand.

By combining the capabilities of EVRYTHNG’s Smart Products Platform with the recycling information service developed by Recycl3R, CPG brands and retailers can now boost consumer engagement and trust, by providing clear recycling information to consumers through smart packaging, and then by rewarding good recycling habits. At the same time, thanks to item-level tracking and business intelligence, brands can get new insights through the product lifecycle, from sales and distribution to use and disposal.

The COVID-19 vaccines of the BioNTech and Pfizer partnership (Pfizer–BioNTech) and Moderna have received Emergency Use Authorization in Canada, the European Union, the United Kingdom, the United States, and other countries. Many frontline workers and priority population segments have received their first doses. Vaccines from AstraZeneca, Johnson & Johnson, and several other global manufacturers are also arriving (or are expected to arrive soon) and are being distributed for administration around the world. This monumental global effort has shattered the record for vaccine development: the fastest previous vaccine project, Merck’s mumps vaccine, was four and a half years in development (1963–67).

Between 2009 and 2011, there were 1,510 total reports of counterfeit incidents including 1,799 different counterfeit medicine detections. Nearly half involved a counterfeit product or packaging. The most counterfeited drug classes were anti-infectives (most commonly antimalarial drugs) (21%), followed by genito-urinary including erectile dysfunction drugs (15%), cardiovascular (12%) and central nervous system (11%), although every therapeutic class was represented. Other sources have compiled their own figures, and the World Health Organisation estimates that 10% of drugs sold globally are counterfeit.

Medications counterfeiting is a serious matter that involves all the Pharmaceutical Industry worldwide. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), “around 10% to 30% of the medicines sold in developing countries are counterfeit”. Combined with tampering, duplication or substitution (placing inferior goods), counterfeiting affects also brand reputation and brand value.

“GAFA understands that every Generation Z is a digital native,” Rosen said. “While the physical is here to stay, if we look at packaging, which is a physical, tangible thing, it can also expand to be an interface to the digital world.”
Rosen’s presentation, “Combining Physical and Digital Communication Through Packaging,” was just one of 36 at the event. The presentations were broken up into three categories, providing something for everyone: Creative Branding and Packaging Design, New Technology and Materials, and Packaging Innovation and Development.

Technology is making an impact on every step of the manufacturing process. Read our report to discover the advanced manufacturing technology trends.

Bayer is scrambling to get its hands on nearly 1,000 vials of one of its top-selling drugs after a labeling mishap led to them being filled with the wrong hemophilia medicines. The German drugmaker is voluntarily recalling two consumer-level lots that are labeled as containing the hemophilia treatment Kogenate FS but that actually were filled with factor VIII hemophilia A treatment Jivi.

VerifyMe, a provider of comprehensive brand protection and customer engagement solutions that combine ultra-secure product authentication, announced it has signed with Syntax Technology Ltd. (Syntax), HP Indigo’s sole authorized channel partner for China. VerifyMe’s solutions include track and trace and customized engagement strategies with industry-leading online retail monitoring capabilities.

Connected packaging, defined as the integration of technology with your product packaging design, enables enhanced user-experience and customer interaction.

The Spectral Engines’ NIRONE digitalized anti-counterfeit solution enables pharmaceutical companies to efficiently authenticate their products in all at any point in their supply chains from manufacturing to distribution or practically anywhere in the field where product authentication is needed. Our solution combines a pocket-size lab grade spectrometer with mobile app connectivity and cloud-based reference libraries with machine learning making it an extremely powerful tool complementing anti-counterfeit measures. Our scanners are easy to use in the field and the user sees the result within seconds, and our technology enables the user to check the content of the pills even within the blister packaging.

The company says it re-packages spironolactone—used to treat high blood pressure, heart failure, hypokalemia and edema—in 30-, 60- and 90-count bottles. The three suspect 25-mg lots carried an expiration date of July 31, 2022, while the 50-mg lot bears an expiration date of May 31, 2022. The company didn’t say how many total bottles the recall covers.

The US arm of the domestic pharma major is recalling Testosterone Cypionate Injection in the American market, according to the latest enforcement report of the US Food and Drug Administration. [...] Elaborating on the reasons for the Class III recall, the USFDA said: "Incorrect Labelling: Incorrect lot number on secondary packaging."