WuXi PharmaTech Corporate Venture Fund to Invest in TruTag Security Platform for Drug Safety
SHANGHAI, CHINA, and HONOLULU, HI ─ April 1, 2014 ─ WuXi PharmaTech (Cayman) Inc. (NYSE: WX), a leading pharmaceutical, biotechnology and medical device R&D services company with operations in China and the United States, and TruTag Technologies, Inc., developer of the leading edible, covert security platform to address the global product counterfeiting challenge, today announced that WuXi Corporate Venture Fund has made an investment in TruTag. In addition, WuXi and TruTag will explore collaborations to offer WuXi’s global customers the TruTag on-dose authentication solution to help prevent counterfeiting and to enhance drug safety.
TruTag microtags (“TruTags®”) are inert and edible and can integrate into the fabric of a product without packaging or labels – much like fingerprints on a human being – for the authentication of food, drugs, electronics, consumer products, and industrial components. Millions of optical patterns can be embedded into a TruTag, a dust-sized particle smaller than the width of a human hair. Using this technology, brand owners, including pharmaceutical companies, will be able to field-read finished tablets circulating in the wholesale and retail market to determine the authenticity and provenance of medicines, including detailed information such as site and date of manufacture, lots, and other critical data.
“TruTag is very excited to work with WuXi to explore the development of our on-dose authentication solution for WuXi’s pharmaceutical customers,” said Dr. Hank C.K. Wuh, Chairman of TruTag Technologies. “This innovative technology is an important new weapon in fighting the growing global problem of counterfeit drugs.”
“WuXi is pleased to invest in this cutting-edge technology and to explore its further development to enhance patient safety and protect our customers’ intellectual property,” said Dr. Ge Li, Chairman and CEO of WuXi PharmaTech.
About WuXi PharmaTech
WuXi PharmaTech (NYSE: WX) is a leading pharmaceutical, biotechnology and medical device R&D outsourcing company, with operations in China and the United States. As a research-driven and customer-focused company, WuXi PharmaTech provides pharmaceutical, biotechnology and medical device companies with a broad and integrated portfolio of laboratory and manufacturing services throughout the drug and medical device R&D process. WuXi PharmaTech’s services are designed to help its global partners in shortening the cycle and lowering the cost of drug and medical device R&D. The operating subsidiaries of WuXi PharmaTech are known as WuXi AppTec.
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.
Media Contact
WuXi PharmaTech
Ronald Aldridge
Director of Investor Relations
+1.201.585.2048
ron_aldridge@wuxiapptec.com
Aaron Shi
Associate Director of Corporate Communications
+86 21 5046 4362
TruTag Technologies
Paula Page
+1.650.279.3881
paula@paulapagepr.com