EWarna Gets Patent for Online Color System

EWarna.com International Ltd., which markets online color approval systems, has been awarded a U.S. patent for its LabWorks Pro application, part of the company’s suite of color solutions.

The patent covers eWarna’s “system and method for online color algorithm exchange,” according to the U.S. Patent Office. The application allows designers and suppliers to exchange color formulas and recipes over the Internet. So a supplier in Zurich can measure dye loadings or primaries for a user in Shanghai who wants to get a recipe for a color measured in New York. Or a designer in San Francisco can share a color palette with colleagues in Hong Kong and London just by cutting and pasting colors into shared folders, which can be searched by color and other attributes over the Internet.

“Color measurement data is not like length or weight measurement data. It needs algorithms to explain it so that information systems can use it just like other product attribute measurements,” explained eWarna co-founder Richard Lawn. “By delivering data and algorithms via Web services, eWarna allows inventory to be sorted by precise color as easily as by date and shipped items to be matched by color as easily as by size, within existing inventory and logistics systems.”

The company, based in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, also markets an e-dipping service called XMatch, which allows companies to do color matching over the Internet.

Ewarna’s U.S. headquarters is in Marietta, Ga. —R.M.