PRNewswire, London, September 22. BRUSSELS, Belgium and PRINCETON, New Jersey - A typical mobile barcode application. (PRNewsFoto/GS1 Mobile Com) BRUSSELS AND PRINCETON, BELGIUM AND NJ UNITED STATES

    BRUSSELS, Belgium and PRINCETON, New Jersey, September 22 /PRNewswire/
-- GS1 is the global supply chain standards organisation well-known for its
barcodes that feature on millions of products sold in retail. It has
membership from over one million companies worldwide, particularly
manufacturers and retailers of consumer packaged goods.

    GS1 Mobile Com is an industry-wide initiative started by GS1 in June
2007 to investigate the potential of businesses giving consumers access to
product information via their mobile phones. Today, GS1 Mobile Com has
released a position paper advising businesses to focus on GS1 standard
barcodes for mobile applications. The aim is to prevent fragmentation in
the current market for reading barcodes with cameraphones. The full
position paper is available at
http://www.gs1.org/docs/mobile/GS1_Mobile_Com_Barcodes_Position_Paper.pdf .

    Vanderlei Roque dos Santos, eBusiness Project Manager for Nestle and
co-chair of the GS1 Mobile Com work group, said, "This is a major step
forward in simplifying the choices manufacturers have to make to start
enabling mobile services via their products. It will drive innovation not
only on product packaging but across a number of communication channels
that brands use to interact with consumers."

    "Mobile barcodes are one of the ways that retailers can use to improve
in-store experience for consumers. Having standards will make
implementation easier and faster, across different markets," commented
Olivier Raynal, Innovation Manager for Carrefour.

    More and more consumers are equipped with camera phones that are
technically capable of reading barcodes. As well as the existing barcodes
on products packaging (called 1-dimensional or 1D barcodes), new barcodes
specifically designed to be scanned by a camera (called 2-dimensional or 2D
barcodes) are now becoming available. As the pictures below show, barcodes
can be "scanned" by consumers to access:



    - information currently on the pack in a personalized format (allergens,
      ingredients, nutrition facts).
    - a wide range of information not currently available on packaging
    - information that may be currently be handled on paper (such as coupons)


    A typical mobile barcode application :
    (Photo: http://www.newscom.com/cgi-bin/prnh/20080922/321463 )
    As well as providing additional services to consumers, mobile barcode
applications can play a role in improving supply-chain efficiency,
particularly where smaller manufacturers and retailers are involved who do
not currently use electronic standards and automated processes.

    The GS1 Mobile Com group has completed an in-depth study of potential
applications available in the GS1 Mobile Com White Paper available from
http://www.gs1.org/mobile/.

    GS1 is working to align this initiative with other mobile code efforts
in the mobile industry and looks forward to working more closely with the
mobile industry in the coming months and years.

    Additional quotes:

    "Until now, the lack of standards has been a major hindrance in the
usage of 2D barcodes, hence compromising the development of win-win
relationships between retailers and manufacturers based on maximizing the
product information available for the consumers at the point of sale. The
GS1 recommendation for the harmonization of the 2D code usage now opens a
new area of collaboration which will translate into a better service to
empower the purchase decisions of the consumers worldwide". Georges-Edouard
Dias, E-Business Director, L'Oreal

    "Global standards are going to revolutionise the way consumers and
manufactures interact in store. The mobile phone will become an enabler to
help provide consumers with better information so they can make more
informed purchasing decisions." Khurram Hamid, Global Head Mobile Marketing
Innovation, P&G

    For further information, contact Joe Horwood at joe.horwood@gs1.org or
+32-473-33-47-85.

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