Cisco Systems CTO Bill Melohn Joins TruTag Technologies as Senior Scientific Advisor Bill Melohn, IT pioneer, brings extensive network security and systems expertise to support development and commercialization of TruTag’s brand protection and security technology
HONOLULU, HI, ─ February 21, 2012 ─ TruTag Technologies, Inc., a leading product authentication technology company with proprietary solutions in the worldwide anti-‐counterfeiting and brand protection markets, today announced the appointment of Bill Melohn as Senior Scientific Advisor.
Mr. Melohn spent the last 25 years immersed in the Internet and the world of distributed systems. He most recently served as Vice President, Chief Technology Officer of Network Systems at Cisco Systems where his team produced over 200 patents, including work in applied cryptography, network address translation, quality of service, keying infrastructure, secure tunneling and configuration and many other areas. Melohn and his team were two time winners of Cisco’s Pioneer Technology Award and are one of the top engineering teams to bring innovation to Cisco’s product line.
“We are extremely pleased to have Bill Melohn join us as a Senior Scientific Advisor,” said Kent Mansfield, President of TruTag Technologies. “Mr. Melohn’s tremendous knowledge and experience as an innovator and pioneer in network systems and security, including his tenure as Chief Technology Officer of Network Systems at Cisco, will be a tremendous asset to TruTag Technologies as we establish our place in the market as a global leader in the development of advanced solutions and products for security and brand protection.”
“Protecting pharmaceutical brands and other premium goods from counterfeiters is an enormous problem, especially from a technical aspect,” said Mr. Melohn. “TruTag’s covert edible silica microtags represent a very new and exciting approach and I am eager to assist in its development and commercialization.”
TruTag Technologies Inc. addresses the worldwide counterfeit markets totaling over $312 billion, including the pharmaceutical, food, and nutritional supplements counterfeit problem, estimated to exceed $80 billion annually.
TruTag Technologies has developed a low-‐cost, heat-‐resistant, and edible silica microtag (called TruTag™) that can help to prevent counterfeiting, improve tracking and authentication, provide informatics for product and component tracking through the supply chain, add efficiency to clinical trials administration, and assure product quality in pharmaceuticals, food and beverage, medical devices, luxury goods, electronic components, and industrial parts.
Each microtag contains a unique, custom-‐manufactured spectral signature chosen from a library of over one trillion possibilities, allowing these microtags to serve as covert, “edible bar codes” that can be associated with a wide array of product information. TruTag Technologies has offices in Honolulu, HI; Oakland, CA; and Dallas, TX.
Prior to joining Cisco, Melohn was at Sun Microsystems, where he created the Internet Engineering Group. Melohn has co-‐authored several Internet RFCs, including Requirements for Internet Hosts and the Point to Point Protocol. He was director of Software Engineering at file server maker Auspex Systems, and the director of network engineering at Silicon Graphics where he his team designed the world’s fastest TCP/IP-‐based network equipment, file servers, and web server platforms. At Flowwise Networks, he was VP of engineering where he led the team that designed a routing accelerator that won numerous industry awards.
About TruTag Technologies
TruTag Technologies is the developer of a leading edible, covert security platform to address the trillion-dollar global illicit product challenge and the $200 billion market for counterfeit drugs. TruTags® are edible, dust-sized particles embedded with spectral data into the very fabric of a product, much like fingerprints on a person, without the need for labels or packaging. TruTag’s covert, low–cost, heat–resistant, and edible silica microtags serve as bar codes and can be incorporated into solid, oral-dose medications as well as other materials and products. The unique physical properties of TruTags® provide a vast library of available unique codes, which allow for tracking of high-volume, high-value items at product or even batch levels. This business information tool can be used in a variety of products, such as pharmaceuticals, nutritional supplements, food, electronics, industrial components, consumer goods, and medical devices.
The TruTag® security platform provides superior brand protection, enhances the safety and traceability of food and medicine, improves tracking and logistics, assures product quality, optimizes efficiency in clinical trial administration, provides informatics for product and component tracking through the supply chain, and enables the Internet of Things. TruTag Technologies, Inc., is a 2014 Technology Pioneer as selected by the World Economic Forum, an honor awarded to the world’s most innovative and influential companies whose technology can significantly impact the way business and society operates. Learn more at www.TruTags.com.
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