An alumnus of the prestigious MIT Sloan School of Management, Padmakumar is a passionate entrepreneur who believes in the power of modern day technologies to solve diverse challenges that today’s dynamic business landscape throws at organizations.

Earlier, although issues pertaining to counterfeits did exist, it was a very difficult task that could be done by only a skilled individual. But in today’s Gen AI world where anyone can easily create any photo, video or content, it has now become very easy to create fake/lookalike products of any brand. As a result, counterfeit is emerging as one of the major challenges for brands worldwide. Also, although techniques such as QR codes or barcodes are very beneficial to various industries, they are very susceptible to counterfeits. Additionally, no matter how many advanced features or techniques that brands might implement to avoid fakes, it is almost impossible for the end customers to identify the genuine products from fake ones. Thus, it is important for brands to come-up with a new digital technology that is not only impossible for the counterfeiters to fake or even identify, but also enables the end customers to easily scan the product using their smartphones and confirm its originality. Furthermore, brands also have an effective mechanism in place that will alert them if any of the customers detect a fake/counterfeit product and quickly take the necessary action. To summarize, end customers also have a prominent role to play in the brands' fight against counterfeits.

Challenges in Tackling Counterfeits

Most of the countries today are coming up with stringent policies and frameworks around counterfeits – for instance, Digital Product Passport (DPP) in Europe which says that every product should have its own digital identity. While brands are increasingly implementing new age anti-counterfeit practices such as QR codes, unique numbers, and track & trace, counterfeiters too are now coming-up with fake products that have the same numbers/codes as that of the original ones. This has been one of the biggest hurdles for brands across all industries for tackling the counterfeits problem.

Although technologies help the brands to some extent against counterfeits, they are not entirely foolproof

Blockchain technology is indeed enabling brands to enhance the traceability of their products across the entire lifecycle - from production to distribution and supply. However, this too is rendered ineffective against the counterfeit products as they also have real codes. As a result, technologies only help the brands to some extent against counterfeits, but they are not entirely fool-proof. Thus, it is imperative for brands to develop new technologies that can act as an additional layer on top of the regular QR codes, track & trace solutions and other anti-counterfeit features. Another major challenge for brands has been the highly unorganized and random nature of the counterfeiters’ distribution network, which makes it almost impossible for the brands or law enforcement agencies to track them or predict their future activities.

Importance of Innovation in Anti-counterfeit Solutions

Technologies such as blockchain and RFID are very expensive and demand a lot of capital to be implemented within the production process. As a result, many companies especially in emerging markets are unable to implement these modern day technologies due to budgetary constraints and thus rely on hardware based anti-counterfeit solutions, which offer less protection against fakes and are also easy to surpass. Thus, there is an immediate need for technology companies to rapidly innovate and come-up with new digital anti-counterfeit solutions that are scalable, effective and affordable for all businesses.