MARLTON, N.J. – June 2, 2004 – Acsis, Inc., focused on delivering supply chain and business process automation solutions, today announced that Ranbaxy Pharmaceuticals Inc. (Ranbaxy), a wholly owned subsidiary of Ranbaxy Laboratories Limited, India’s largest pharmaceutical company, has chosen Acsis to implement a radio frequency identification (RFID) tracking system to meet Wal-Mart’s RFID mandate for its Class 2 pharmaceutical suppliers.
Ranbaxy joins Acsis’ customer base of leading pharmaceutical companies, turning to Acsis to meet the evolving pharmaceutical tracking compliance requirements of one of its largest retail trading partners, Wal-Mart. Taking effect June 2004, Wal-Mart is requesting that its pharmacy suppliers employ RFID technology to Class 2 prescription drugs, defined as addictive painkillers and other prescription narcotics. In February 2004, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) issued a report on “Combating Counterfeit Drugs,” in which it highlighted RFID tagging as appearing to be “the most promising approach to reliable product tracking and tracing.”
Leveraging expertise from its more than 20 years of data-collection experience with the world’s leading manufacturers and distributors, Acsis will provide for the full implementation of an RFID tracking system for Ranbaxy. Employing its RFID Expert System as a diagnostic troubleshooting tool, Acsis will conduct a thorough analysis of product and labeling attributes for Ranbaxy’s pharmaceuticals and provide technology recommendations that will ensure the best RF read rates and system integration. Through its extensive network of RFID hardware and software partners, Acsis will also facilitate the necessary hardware and software integr! ation, including implementing reader and smart-label equipment.
“Acsis’ history with RFID implementations and pharmaceutical industry domain expertise easily surpassed competitive offerings and made the company the only choice to help us quickly comply with Wal-Mart’s RFID tracking initiatives for Class 2 drugs,” said Kevin Lindholm, Manager, Ranbaxy.
“Acsis is an integral part of our strategy not only to comply with the requirements of trading partners and regulatory bodies, but also to leverage RFID for business benefits. Although Ranbaxy is new to RFID, Acsis’ extensive offering gives us the confidence of knowing that our system will be implemented the right way the first time, without committing additional unplanned resources to the project,” said Suneet Walia, Executive Director IS, Ranbaxy.
“Early adopters of RFID like Ranbaxy stand to gain the most from what will be the inevitable and pervasive adoption of RFID throughout the pharmaceutical industry,” said Dennis E. O'Malley, Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer, Acsis. “With our deep understanding of how drugs must be tracked and traced in the supply chain combined with industry-leading RFID and data-collection technology expertise, we are able to ensure that Ranbaxy is equipped to exploit the business opportunities in this complex compliance and technology venture.”
