Counterfeit parts and products cause a significant risk to the aerospace industry. In fact, the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) confirmed in 2018 that 3,000 suspected counterfeit parts had been discovered since 2011. While these parts disrupt the logistics of the aerospace industry, they also pose a significant threat to passengers and staff with reports highlighting that ‘unapproved parts’ contributed to two dozen airplane crashes since 2011 which resulted in seven fatalities and 18 injuries.
As the aerospace industry begins to gather pace again following the Covid-19 pandemic, with 22.2 million domestic and global airline flights in 2021, it is vital that aerospace suppliers protect airline staff and passengers from the ever-growing risk of counterfeit parts and electronics.
To help tackle the rise in counterfeit parts, we have created the world’s first quantum anti-counterfeit solution for the aerospace industry.
While the aerospace industry has taken on board stringent measures and anti-counterfeit solutions, unapproved parts are still entering the supply chain. The particular difficulty with such a global industry is detecting where exactly these counterfeit aerospace parts enter the supply chain.
Our Q-ID® Optical tags provide security at an atomic level, exploiting the inherent randomness of quantum materials to create a solution which cannot be cloned by counterfeiters. These unique identities (Quantum Signature) can be integrated easily into any existing manufacturing process at a large scale and low cost. Able to be incorporated at both packaging and product level, unique identities can be read by a standard smartphone camera.
This allows the process of authentication to take place in just a few seconds, far quicker than many other counterfeit solutions. All you need to do to authenticate a product is download the Quantum Base app. This uses your smartphone camera to read the Q-ID® tag and provide all relevant product information relating to aerospace parts. This process can be done across the global supply chain, ensuring only approved, genuine aerospace parts and electronics make it into the air, therefore maximising efficiencies, and securing safety and protection.
With an average of over 1 million parts in modern commercial passenger aircraft, amounting to billions of new parts annually, counterfeiters have begun to capitalise on what is a growing industry.
In the worst case, counterfeit aerospace parts can cause significant injury and fatalities whilst also damaging supplier reputations.
Our anti-counterfeit solution safeguards the integrity and identity of each part against counterfeit substitutes, to protect lives and supply chains. Alongside these, you can also enjoy:
If you would like to learn more about how our Q-ID® tags can provide reliable anti-counterfeiting for your company, get in touch.