Jamison RFID and Cybra have jointly introduced the new Cybra-Hawk RFID-based electronic article surveillance (EAS) loss-prevention and inventory-management solution, a portal station that the two companies say is designed to meet the special requirements of retailers.

The Cybra-Hawk portal

The solution combines Cybra's EdgeMagic RFID Control software platform—designed to manage edge devices and to commission, write to, read and verify RFID tags—with Jamison RFID's Hawk RFID all-in-one read station, a power over Ethernet (PoE) RFID portal that includes a choice of available RFID readers and four high-gain antennas. The Hawk is designed for collecting tag data only, without additional alarms and electronics. At 39 inches tall and 12 inches wide, the Hawk is lightweight and can be mounted to a wall or doorway quickly and easily, according to Jamison RFID. It plugs into an Ethernet device and can be easily integrated with back-end systems (all wiring, connectors and cabling are in place).

The Cybra-Hawk solution allows retailers to use real-time, RFID-based EAS technology to help prevent theft and shrinkage, the companies reports, as well as track and manage inventory at the item level across the supply chain. The Cybra-Hawk portal solves the problem of false reads that occur when retailers use RFID solutions designed for warehouses in their retail environments. Distribution center dock doors have much broader read zones than, for example, a customer entrance to a mall store, the companies explain. Warehouse RFID solutions will pick up too many false reads if placed in a store. The Cybra-Hawk portal, in contrast, provides a focused read zone that can be used for receiving items, automating inventory counts on the shelf, preventing theft and transacting sales at a checkout counter. A combined EAS and RFID tag eliminates manual counts and bar-code scanning.

The Cybra-Hawk solution is available now.