Business environment today has provided enterprises with opportunities to grow online and expand globally.

1. Counterfeiting Activities Damaging the Brands
Business environment today has provided enterprises with opportunities to grow online and
expand globally. The ever-growing customer requirements for technological enhancements such
as upgrading of business environment, wider web presence and changes in products and
services, also provide scope for fraudulent activities, counterfeiting and patent thefts that leave
a negative impact on the brand's reputation.
A brand showcases the intrinsic character of an enterprise and its business and needs to be
protected from counterfeiters and fraudsters. Effective brand management requires enterprises’
to understand the type of threat and their origin. Counterfeiting is one such threat that affects the
brand reputation in a big way as it involves manufacturing of duplicate products and selling
them illegally. The term also includes creating imitations of brands, trademark, documents,
software, pharmaceuticals, electronic goods, luxury products, patents and currencies to deceive
the customer. These goods produced illegally have fake logos and brands which leads to patent
and trademark infringement. Nevertheless, these counterfeit goods which are sold at a lesser
price than the originals have a wider market.
The counterfeiting market is growing at a fast pace and to control this one must first understand
the reason for it. To meet the growing demands of the customer as well as to withstand the
competition, enterprises tend to outsource the production of goods and development of software
application to third party vendors. This leads to loss of control over their critical data, designs,
operational strategies, processes, trademarks and copyrights. The survey conducted by the
Counterfeiting Intelligence Bureau (CIB) of the International Chamber of Commerce (ICC)
showcases that counterfeit goods take up nearly 5-7% of the annual world trade which amounts to
$700 billion every year.

2. Further, today's technology landscape having enabled a wide use of e-commerce for both B2B and
B2C markets provides the counterfeiters also with an online market for their activities. With such
threats affecting the bottom line enterprises lookout for anti-counterfeiting solutions that will
help them overcome the counterfeiting activities and increase the market share. For organizations
with a widespread global and online presence, leading service providers have developed brand
protection solutions that will help overcome the counterfeiting threats.
The anti-counterfeiting solutions provides a dynamic visibility that enables enterprises to identify
the culprits and protect their trademarks. The inclusion of quantitative methods and market
intelligent practices into the solutions ensures easy identification of counterfeit copies evaluates
the risks and monitors their activities in real-time, enabling enterprises to take up effective
measures to curb the counterfeiting activities.
Read More About: enterprise risk management, Anti-Fraud, gray market.