Goose Tracker gains ground with Indian pharma industry

In a bid to combat the growing threat of counterfeits, three Indian pharmaceutical companies have decided to install track-and-trace software developed by Goose Technologies.

The companies - Strides Arcolab, Indoco Remedies and Macleods Pharmaceuticals - will use the Goose Tracker software solution to generate more than 150 million unique serial numbers annually for primary, secondary and tertiary packaging. The software creates, manages and tracks the serial numbers, which are printed on the packaging.

Goose's founder and chief executive, Deb Pattnaik, said that a number of other companies had also expressed interest in using Goose Tracker because of its ease of adoption, scalability and performance capability.

"Tracker features robust encrypted serialisation and package authentication capability, designed to ensure consumer safety, reduce counterfeiting and diversion of product," he added.

Goose launched its Procon Tracker serialisation system earlier this year (see India's Goose launches serialisation platform). The GS1-compliant system is based on proprietary serial number generation and encryption algorithms, and does not store serial numbers as an added security layer. It also supports offline tracking for supply chain participants which do not have access to the main database. Another notable benefit of the system is that it eliminates the need to purchase new hardware, wherever possible.

Although the Tracker is not limited to use in medicines packaging, Goose has been developing a strong presence in the pharmaceutical industry. This is largely because of the Indian government's mandatory barcoding scheme for medicines exports.

Under the first phase of the scheme's implementation, all exporters of medicines were required to add a 1D barcode to shipper or cartons of pharmaceuticals manufactured on or after 1 October 2011. The government has set a deadline of 1 January, 2012, for adding serialised codes to secondary packaging (2D or 1D code) and 1 July, 2012, for primary packaging (2D datamatrix).

India has been widely reported as a hotspot for counterfeit medicines and a number of companies have launched security products there. Sproxil, for example, has had recent success in the Indian market with its medicine authentication system technology. Technology giant HP has also entered the market with its Global Authentication Service, a cloud-based track-and-trace solution.  

Goose is displaying the Tracker system's capability this week at the CPhI India exhibition in Mumbai.