Anti Copying in Design has struck a partnership with online brand protection and reputation management specialist SnapDragon Monitoring to tackle counterfeiting.
A recent SnapDragon survey discovered that nearly a fifth UK SMEs have fallen victim to counterfeit product sales, resulting in severe financial losses for 93% of them. Counterfeiting is estimated to cost companies £9bn in lost sales in the UK.
The collaboration between ACID and SnapDragon aims to offer guidance, advice, and technical monitoring to protect assets. Leveraging SnapDragon’s AI platform, Swoop, SMEs can search the Internet to detect brand threats, infringements on registered and unregistered IPRs, and counterfeit product listings. They can then take action to remove these threats before they damage sales, brand reputation, or customer safety.
‘Imitation is not the sincerest form of flattery, especially when it has the potential to jeopardise sales, brands, and safety. This partnership empowers organisations to act swiftly on IP infringements and eliminate them from the Internet, providing a robust resource for small and independent businesses battling the counterfeit threat,’ says Dids Macdonald ACID ceo.
‘Counterfeits are a huge problem, yet traditional brand protection has always been geared towards bigger businesses, though counterfeits affect companies of all sizes. It doesn’t matter if you are a global enterprise, or a small boutique designer, if you have developed a product, you hold the rights to its ownership and fraudsters should never get away with banking on your success. We are in the business to support these organisations, offering them accessible brand and IP protection to help them keep the products they have worked tirelessly to create safe,’ says Rachel Jones, SnapDragon Monitoring founder.
