In Brazil we have the obligation to implement the Drug Traceability defined by the Law 13.410 and we have two types of communication to cover.
The first one is the Vertical communication that is the information we need to send to ANVISA. This information flow is only for regulatory purposes and allows ANVISA to receive and process the drug traceability information in order to avoid illegal products in the market and identify potential health problems based on the medicines consumption.
In this scenario, ANVISA are not aware about the information flow in the supply chain and it put in the private sector the need to create a parallel information flow to connect each trading partner in order to exchange information about inbound and outbound operations.
The problem. Of course we have all the technology available to do it but unfortunately we also have some problems to keep all the stakeholders aligned in the direction to standardize the communication and without a initiative like this one, each trading partner can spend a lot of money to organize all the customers and suppliers around one (or more than one) standard. Doesn´t matter here which standard or technology to use but the problem is that each one will have their own preferences and the cost probably will be increased because of it.
The initiative. The GS1 Horizontal Communication working group can address this problem by putting all the stakeholders looking in one direction and looking for the best way to connect the supply chain, saving money and time. In this way we are all aligned that the standard can speed up the traceability implementation and it is the initial step to have a connected supply chain using a neutral standard.
This neutral standard can solve the problem we have today where we have many Level 4 companies in the market that have a lot of data but no standard connections among them. This situation is forcing trading partners to manage many connections to keep their business running increasing the operational costs for all players.
For this standard doesn´t matter the content you are sending to the next node of the supply chain. It can be (preferred) the ANVISA SNCM files, GS1 EPCIS, Eletronic Invoice xml or any other file.
Using this approach we believe that we can have a cost effective solution that can enable companies and providers to exchange information and explore the value of the data around an open standard.
If you believe that you can cooperate with us, please stay in touch with us using the following contact below.
Please if you have any doubt, please send message to ricardo.melo@gs1br.org..
Access the current version of the Spec in the link below.