Quality protection of capital goods based on unique and component inherent characteristics realized with a batch-fingerprint

资本货物，特别是其组件在整个供应链和价值链中的明确可追溯性对制造商和客户至关重要。由于缺乏可追溯性和市场透明度不足，导致顾客对产品质量失去信心，而这种信心也是建立在产品原产地证明能力的基础上的。此外，制造商还面临着不合理的责任索赔风险，这些索赔涉及并非由原始设备制造商引起的组件故障。目前，虽然存在很多实现或至少应用标识进行标识的标记技术，但由于其自身的特点，它们是可以被复制的。本课题主要研究基于独特和成分固有特征的识别技术。通过这些特征的随机分布，制造商和客户可以免受假冒产品的侵害。目的是调查单个材料批次中材料特性的独特分布。因此，采用了两种光谱分析方法：发射光谱法（OES）和能量色散x射线光谱法（EDX）。其目的是提供一个独特的批量指纹，这是整个供应链和价值链的特征，并保证可追溯性，特别是对资本货物组件。因此，有可能识别严重磨损的部件。针对制造商的不合理的责任索赔可以通过批量指纹来反驳。因此，明确的可追溯性得到了保证，这样做可以保护资本品的质量。

The unambiguous traceability of capital goods and in particular of its components all along the supply and value chain is of central importance for the manufacturers and customers. The lack of traceability and the insufficient market transparency caused thereby have the effect that customers lose their confidence in product quality which also bases on the ability of proving the product origin. Additionally, manufacturers are threatened by the risk of unjustified liability claims referring to component failures which are not caused by the original equipment manufacturers. Currently, a lot of marking technologies implementing or at least applying signs for identification exists but due to their characteristics they can be copied. The research project focuses on the investigation of identification technologies based on unique and component inherent characteristics. By the stochastic distribution of these characteristics manufacturers and customers are protected against counterfeit products.The objective is the investigation of a unique distribution of material characteristics in single material batches. Therefore, the two spectrometric analysis optical emission spectrometry (OES) and energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDX) is used. The aim is to provide a unique batch-fingerprint which is characteristic for the entire supply and value chain and guaranties the traceability especially for capital goods components. Thereby, it is possible to identity heavily worn components. Unjustified liability claims against the manufacturer can be disproved with the batch-fingerprint. As the result, the unambiguous traceability is guaranteed and by doing so the quality of the capital good is protected.