Hogan Lovells and Intertek Address Growing Global and Online Challenges in Consumer Products Safety
10 May 2016
Global law firm Hogan Lovells and Intertek, total quality assurance provider, have joined forces to share insights into the challenges faced by the consumer products industry.
Speaking at a joint event in London, Safe products: foreseeable use in today's marketplace, Rod Freeman, head of Hogan Lovells' international product litigation & compliance team, said: "In today's competitive global and online marketplace, understanding and managing risk in the consumer products industry is more and more challenging. International companies are having to take a fresh approach to how they deal with market pressures, the demands of regulators, and their risks of liability."
The event, attended by lawyers and business leaders in consumer product supply, manufacturing and retail, addressed product usage and risks when selling to all types of consumers, and the question of where responsibility for consumer safety lies.
Addressing the event, Intertek’s Dr. Jeremy Opperer said many product usage risks can be managed out simply by spending extra time working out how a consumer might use or misuse a product: “You don’t need to wait until an issue happens, you need to think about use and misuse before a product goes to market,” Dr. Opperer said, adding: “While it is true that understanding product usage is a critical part of understanding product risk, we need to address how far manufacturers, retailers and suppliers have to go to consider the foreseeable use and misuse of their products.”
Rob van Dorp, Intertek Chief Executive UK & Eire, said: “Intertek remains at the forefront of product assurance and risk and safety assessment, both here in the UK and globally, which means our experts are well placed to provide vital advice to the industry on how to manage risk at the right point in the supply chain."
About Intertek
Intertek is a leading Total Quality Assurance provider to industries worldwide. Our network of more than 1,000 laboratories and offices and over 40,000 people in more than 100 countries, delivers innovative and bespoke Assurance, Testing, Inspection and Certification solutions for our customers’ operations and supply chains.
Bringing quality and safety to life
About Hogan Lovells
Hogan Lovells is a leading global law firm providing business-oriented legal advice and high-quality service across its exceptional breadth of practices to clients around the world. For more information about Hogan Lovells, go to www.hoganlovells.com. Where case studies are included, results achieved do not guarantee similar outcomes for other clients.
Media enquiries:
Joanne Merriweather
Intertek UK PR Manager
Tel: +44 (0) 7786 525390
Email: joanne.merriweather@intertek.com
Orla O'Donovan
PR Senior Adviser, Hogan Lovells
Tel: +44 (0)20 7296 2815
Email: orla.odonovan@hoganlovells.com