Smart closures

The chemical, food and pharmaceutical industries are domains where counterfeit protection is essential to sales while also safeguarding the manufacturer’s reputation. Today’s consumer expects to see precise product information as well as further details, such as dosing instructions and the use-by date. Demands have risen, but thanks to state-of-the-art technology, it is now possible to meet  this challenge on the actual packaging.

There are good reasons why packaging manufacturers are now focusing on closure systems that warrant the highest level of originality for packaged products. After all, this is often the only place where a consumer can see whether a box of tablets or a drinks bottle is genuine. Quite often an innovative wireless-based technology is used for such packaging purposes, known as Near Field Communication (NFC).

It can also...

• read out a patient leaflet aloud,
• automatically reorder medication,
• interactively show luminescent effects on the display.

The closure specialists KISICO, who are based in the German state of Hesse, have enabled packaging companies to insert programmable chips into lids, tabs, etc. without the need for further expenses. NFCap it is an innovative technology that allows contactless communication between the outwardly invisible chip and the consumer’s NFC-enabled device. The information that has been placed on the chip gives the user details of any counterfeit probability as well as additional facts and figures and any web addresses that may be relevant. For pharmaceutical companies safety is also a matter of hygiene standards, and so it goes without saying that the chip in the lid does not come into contact with the product inside.

Another market player that is extremely keen to emphasise product safety aspects of its closures is a packaging firm called the Schreiner Group. This German family enterprise, which is based in Bavaria, first presented the advanced development of its safety solution – called Flexi-Cap – to the industry last year. What is new is that the tear-off strip no longer runs through the foil cap, but is directly integrated into the label. “When you open the tear-off strip, it automatically destroys the design of the original label, so that it becomes impossible to reuse the container illegally without drawing attention,” says Ann L Merchant, Managing Director of Schreiner MediPharm, a company within the Schreiner Group that designs solutions for the pharmaceutical industry and in medical technology. It is clearly bad news for so-called “dumpster divers” who collect drug containers with original labels and then fill them with counterfeit content – a lucrative yet also dangerous business.

The Flex-Cap Plus is available in a variety of types, shapes and sizes of glass containers. In addition, the lid can also integrate further details via barcodes or NFC chips for interactive purposes.