Product container containing a magnetic identifier

Abstract: A non-magnetic material such as cardboard or plastic is used as the packaging material for the product to be protected from counterfeiting. The packaging material is configured as a box whose parts are bonded together by use of a hot-melt adhesive. The adhesive contains magnetic particles such as barium ferrite, and small molten globules of adhesive are applied to appropriate surfaces of the box during box fabrication. The box parts are folded to form the finished box, and under the application of pressure the globules of adhesive spread out and solidify, bonding the box surfaces together. It will be noted that presence of the magnetic particles in the adhesive does not modify the box fabrication procedure in any way, and that the box material may be processed and the box's surfaces printed in the usual manner. The solidified adhesive serves as a magnetic recording medium by virtue of the imbedded magnetic particles. A magnetic mark may be recorded either by means of a record head, or by means of a magnetic roller. The magnetic recording of this mark, the presence of which is not visually discernable, is detectable by means of a magnetic reproduce head or an optical viewer responsive to magnetized media, and the encoded recorded information used to authenticate the genuineness of the packaged product.

Description: This invention relates to a product container, and in particular to a container incorporating a non-obvious marker as a identifier and authenticator of a genuine product. The growing global economy has been accompanied by an alarming increase in pirating and counterfeiting of well known products. In addition to counterfeiting of the products themselves, the packaging which contains and identifies the product is being duplicated by means of sophisticated printing systems, and the duplicating of the container is done with such fidelity that it is difficult to distinguish it from the genuine article. This undetected pirating results in losses of billions of dollars in revenue to legitimate businesses, and also dilutes and compromises the valuable trademarks of the products being pirated. Before describing the invention which uses an adhesive mixed with magnetic particles, it will be noted that in the prior art disclosure has been made of magnetic particles incorporated in an adhesive. For example, U.S. Patent #4,937,995 discloses use of magnetic material added to an adhesive used as a roof sealant where the measurement of the inductance of the adhesive in a roof seam allows the identification of the supplier of the roofing material. In U.S. Patent #4,427,481 magnetized magnetic particles in a flowable adhesive, "pull" two members forming a joint together by magnetic attraction to aid sealing by the adhesive. The UK 1 087 815 discloses a method of heating materials using alternating magnetic fields. The material used in this invention consists of multidomain nonconductive antiferromagnetic particles which are mixed with polymer-modified petrolium wax. The abstract of the CN 1 090 661-A discloses a magnetic recording material composition which consits of a high molecular material and a magnetic powder for recognition of commodities. Other uses of magnetic particles in an adhesive are disclosed in the prior art, but unlike the teaching of the present invention such disclosures are not directed to detection of counterfeit products. These and other objects of the present invention are achieved by the characterizing features of claim 1. A non-magnetic material such as cardboard or plastic is used as the packaging material for the product to be protected from counterfeiting. The packaging material is configured as a box whose parts are bonded together by use of a hot-melt adhesive. The adhesive contains magnetic particles such as barium ferrite, and small globules of molten adhesive are applied to appropriate surfaces of the box during box fabrication. The box parts are folded to form the finished box, and under the application of pressure the globules of adhesive spread out, cool and solidify, bonding the box surfaces together. It will be noted that presence of the magnetic particles in the adhesive does not modify the box fabrication procedure in any way, and that the box material may be processed and the box's surfaces printed in the usual manner. The solidified adhesive serves as a magnetic recording medium by virtue of the imbedded magnetic particles. A magnetic mark may be recorded either by means of a record head, or by means of a magnetic roller. The magnetic recording of this mark, the presence of which is not visually discernable, is detectable by means of a magnetic reproduce head or a magnetic optical viewer responsive to magnetized media, and the encoded recorded information used to authenticate the genuineness of the packaged product. The invention will be described with respect to the drawings of which: Fig.1 illustrates an unassembled box with small globules of adhesive containing magnetic particles applied to appropriate box tabs, and Fig. 2 is a drawing of the box of Fig. 1, assembled and held together by an adhesive having magnetically recordable areas. DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS A packaging material typically made of cardboard, is shaped as a pattern 10 as shown in Fig. 1. To form a box 10', (Fig. 2), the pattern 10 surfaces are folded along the lines 13, 15, 17, and the tabs 16,18,20,22,24,26,28,30 are folded inward along the lines 32,34, resulting in a rectangular parallelepiped box 10'. (In the drawings, different but related elements are identified by the same reference character, albeit that the different elements are distinguished by primes.) Prior to the folding operation, small globules of adhesive containing magnetic particles 16,18 are placed on the tabs 12,14. A suitable adhesive is thermoplastic wax and suitable magnetic particles are barium ferrite, and to form the adhesive the thermoplastic wax and the barium ferrite particles are combined by weight in the ratio of 1:1. In fabrication of the box 10', the globules of molten adhesive 16,18 flow under applied pressure, cool, solidify, and the tabs 12, 14 remain firmly attached to the tabs 20, 22 respectively when the pressure is removed. In addition to affixing tab 14 to tab 22, and tab 12 to tab 20, under the applied pressure the globules of adhesive 16,18 spread into flattened disks, 16'18' of magnetic media suitable for supporting magnetic recording thereon. The box 10' is now complete with the product inside it; the box having been folded around the product. The box 10' is now sealed by folding and gluing the tab 36. Anti-counterfeiting information may be encoded and recorded on the disks 16',18' by a magnetic recording head or by means of a magnetic recording roller. To authenticate the genuineness of the product packaged in the sealed box 10', a magnetic reproduce head or a magnetic optical viewer is used to scan the recorded disks 16', 18' recovering the previously recorded information.

Claims: A container (10') comprising a non-magnetic sheet material forming said container, and adhesive means (16', 18') selectively applied to said non-magnetic sheet material for structurally fixing said container in an assembled configuration, characterized by magnetic material incorporated in said adhesive means, said material not including antiferromagnetic particles; and said adhesive means being capable of magnetic recording thereon, wherein the recording is writable and readable through said non-magnetic sheet material by a magnetic recording head. The container of Claim 1 wherein said adhesive means is a hot melt thermoplastic wax having magnetic barium ferrite particles dispersed therein in a 1:1 relation by weight. The container of Claim 1 wherein said non-magnetic sheet material is provided with tabs (16', 18') and is shaped to form a box upon assembly, and wherein said adhesive material is applied to said tabs to stably set said box.

Inventors: CHAMBERLAIN IV FREDERICK ROCKW, CHAMBERLAIN IV, FREDERICK ROCKWELL
Applicants: EASTMAN KODAK CO, EASTMAN KODAK COMPANY
Application year: 1996
Main classification: B65D5
IPC codes: G08B13, B65D5, B65D25