Chinese Law Enforcement Authorities Counterstrike Product Counterfeiting

02/07/2019, Munich

Police and Klüber Lubrication succeed in uncovering falsifier workshops

Chinese law enforcement authorities succeeded in uncovering a counterfeiting network in the Guangdong province faking huge amounts of products and packages imitating lubricants of the leading German speciality lubricants manufacturer Klüber Lubrication. Thanks to the rigorous investigation of the Chinese authorities a company was detected which has established an illegal nationwide network including raw material manufacturing, distribution, filling facilities, packaging material suppliers and warehouses, as well as shell companies covering the illegal business.

MyKlueber

It is due to the outstanding support of the Chinese law enforcement authorities that this counterfeiting case could be uncovered. Indeed the Ministry of Public Security mandated the Guangdong Police to launch a criminal investigation, which resulted in this major raid already last year. Klüber Lubrication and Freudenberg - as its parent company - very much appreciate the fruitful and open collaboration with the responsible Chinese security authorities and with the German embassy both lasting for several years now.

Falsified Klüber Lubrication products in valorem of more than 3 million RMB (ca. 400 000 Euro) were seized, together with huge amounts of unused packaging materials, labels, accounting books and delivery records. Fake product packaging discovered was imitating the Klüber Lubrication genuine packaging. Imitations where quite similar to the original packing and therefore hardly to identify for a customer. The product quality in the fake packaging in fact is extremely poor and neither meeting Klüber Lubrication nor customer requirements or market standards.

Customers in China repeatedly contact Klüber Lubrication to check authenticity of deliveries in cases where they doubt to have received genuine Klüber Lubrication brand products. The company supports its customers with in-depth chemical analysis and performance tests to verify product quality and thus safeguarding the customers’ operations and to support their own quality management efforts.

As other leading brands, Klüber Lubrication suffers from intellectual property infringements. The most serious problems relate to falsified products. Speciality lubricants are developed and manufactured to meet special requirements of customers and to support them in maintaining a high degree of operational safety and efficiency, to save energy, to protect resources and important company assets. Using improper products also presents a high risk to the safety of the end-users as sudden malfunctions can appear during service life of a device or machine. Furthermore, forged lubricants can result in severe dangers to the customers’ operations and quality management efforts, thereby resulting in financial risks. For example, a loss of almost 20 000 Euro is calculated for every minute of unexpected production stoppage in the automotive industry.

In order to allow customers to perform onsite authenticity checks and thereby safeguard their operations, Klueber Lubrication now offers its customers in China a digital verification tool. “MyKlüber” is smartphone application allowing customers to check the authenticity of the packaging immediately upon receipt or before use of the goods, as well as download product information and safety data sheets by scanning a code on the genuine Klüber packaging. Furthermore, the used innovative near field communication (NFC) technology prevents bringing falsified products into their operations and value chain.

NFC allows secured one- and two-way communication between endpoints, suitable for many applications like contactless payment, social networking or electronic identity documents. It is already used as anti-counterfeit solution in spirituous, luxury goods or textile industry. NFC's communication protocol and encryption offer a pleasant customer experience and a high level of protection at the same time.

“MyKlüber” is free of charge and currently available for Android smartphone on major Chinese App stores like Baidu, Huawei or Tencent. iPhone version will be released early in 2019. If you have any question on “MyKlüber”, our dedicated team remains at your disposal on MyKlueber@cn.klueber.com