WowWee Group Limited, is a privately owned,

Hong Kong Hong Kong ( (US) or (UK); , ), officially the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China ( abbr. Hong Kong SAR or HKSAR), is a city and special administrative region of China on the eastern Pearl River Delt ...

-based

Canadian Canadians (french: Canadiens) are people identified with the country of Canada. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Canadians, many (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of ...

consumer technology company.

History

Initially from Canada, the two founding brothers (Richard and Peter Yanofsky) moved to Hong Kong to form the company in 1982, as an independent

research & development Research and development (R&D or R+D), known in Europe as research and technological development (RTD), is the set of innovative activities undertaken by corporations or governments in developing new services or products, and improving existi ...

and

manufacturing Manufacturing is the creation or production of goods with the help of equipment, labor, machines, tools, and chemical or biological processing or formulation. It is the essence of secondary sector of the economy. The term may refer to a r ...

outfit. As an

OEM An original equipment manufacturer (OEM) is generally perceived as a company that produces non-aftermarket parts and equipment that may be marketed by another manufacturer. It is a common industry term recognized and used by many professional or ...

seller, they produced products such as the

Power Rangers ''Power Rangers'' is an entertainment and merchandising franchise built around a live-action superhero television series, based on the Japanese tokusatsu franchise ''Super Sentai''. Produced first by Saban Entertainment, second by BVS Entert ...

Power Gloves and the Talking Tots dolls. In 1987, the company changed focus, building and marketing toys under their own brand in response to a fall in OEM orders. In 1999, they produced new products including a robotic dog (MegaByte), T-Rex, and the Animaltronics and Dinotronics lines of remote control animals. In 1998 the company was purchased by

Hasbro Hasbro, Inc. (; a syllabic abbreviation of its original name, Hassenfeld Brothers) is an American multinational conglomerate holding company incorporated and headquartered in Pawtucket, Rhode Island. Hasbro owns the trademarks and products of ...

Under Hasbro

Shortly before the Hasbro sale, Peter Yanofsky reportedly caught

physicist A physicist is a scientist who specializes in the field of physics, which encompasses the interactions of matter and energy at all length and time scales in the physical universe. Physicists generally are interested in the root or ultimate caus ...

roboticist Robotics is an interdisciplinary branch of computer science and engineering. Robotics involves design, construction, operation, and use of robots. The goal of robotics is to design machines that can help and assist humans. Robotics integrat ...

Mark Tilden Mark W. Tilden is a robotics physicist who produces complex robotic movements from simple analog logic circuits, often with discrete electronic components, and usually without a microprocessor. He is controversial because of his libertarian Tilden ...

on the

Discovery Channel Discovery Channel (known as The Discovery Channel from 1985 to 1995, and often referred to as simply Discovery) is an American cable channel owned by Warner Bros. Discovery, a publicly traded company run by CEO David Zaslav. , Discovery Channe ...

, and soon hired him as a consultant. Initially Tilden worked part-time with WowWee while he continued his work with the

Los Alamos National Laboratory Los Alamos National Laboratory (often shortened as Los Alamos and LANL) is one of the sixteen research and development laboratories of the United States Department of Energy (DOE), located a short distance northwest of Santa Fe, New Mexico, ...

, but in 2001, Tilden joined the company full-time. One of his first products with WowWee was the B.I.O. Bug, released in 2001. Unfortunately, while sales were good they weren't as strong as either WowWee or Hasbro would have liked. In part this has been attributed to the after-effects of

9/11 The September 11 attacks, commonly known as 9/11, were four coordinated suicide terrorist attacks carried out by al-Qaeda against the United States on Tuesday, September 11, 2001. That morning, nineteen terrorists hijacked four commercial ...

and the

anthrax Anthrax is an infection caused by the bacterium ''Bacillus anthracis''. It can occur in four forms: skin, lungs, intestinal, and injection. Symptom onset occurs between one day and more than two months after the infection is contracted. The sk ...

attacks, while Tilden has also expressed disappointment with some of the limitations placed on the product design by Hasbro. After moving to WowWee full-time in 2001, Tilden focused his attention on developing Robosapien. While Tilden was developing Robosapien, Hasbro canceled the project several times, leading Yanofsky to negotiate out of the contract in 2003. Robosapien was released in 2004, and over 1.5 million were reportedly sold in the first five months of sale. Robosapien was the first commercially available biomorphic robot, and the first to integrate personality-like features. Tilden continued to develop the line with the

Robosapien V2 The Robosapien V2 is the second generation of Mark Tilden's Robosapien robot. It is nearly twice the size of the original robot, standing around tall. Instead of the original caveman grunts, the V2 can speak a large list of pre-recorded phrases ...

(released in 2005), which added functionality like speech capability;

RS Media The RS Media is another product in WowWee's line of biomorphic robots, based on a walking system designed by Mark Tilden. The RS Media uses basically the same body as the Robosapien V2, but a different brain based on a Linux kernel. As the name im ...

™ robot (released in 2006), which included user-created functions, and

Roboreptile The Roboreptile is a toy robot by WowWee. The Roboreptile has infrared and sound sensors, and is able to autonomously explore its environment while avoiding obstacles. It can also operate in different modes where it simulates behaviors of real ani ...

(also in 2006). The

Roboquad Referred to as "The first true robotic arthropod," Roboquad is one of the 5 robots that WowWee announced at CES in January 2007. It is a 4-legged robot that somewhat resembles a spider and a dog. Also designed by Mark Tilden, the Roboquad, like ...

a four-wheeled robot (released in 2007); the RS Tri-Bot, a three-wheeled robot (released in summer 2008), and

(2006). In 2007, working with inventor Sean Frawley, WowWee released the

FlyTech Dragonfly The Flytech Dragonfly is a remote-controlled flying toy manufactured by WowWee. The Dragonfly has been incorrectly billed as the world's first commercially available RC ornithopter (flapping wing aircraft). It was actually preceded by several other ...

a remote control flying

ornithopter An ornithopter (from Greek ''ornis, ornith-'' "bird" and ''pteron'' "wing") is an aircraft that flies by flapping its wings. Designers sought to imitate the flapping-wing flight of birds, bats, and insects. Though machines may differ in form, th ...

. The Dragonfly was named as one of the inventions of the year by Time in 2007. The success of the Dragonfly led to other flying toys, such as the Bladestar (a remote controlled helicopter) and the Butterfly (a wind-up ornithopter aimed at younger children).

Under Optimal Group

On September 27, 2007, the publicly traded

Optimal Group Mathematical optimization (alternatively spelled ''optimisation'') or mathematical programming is the selection of a best element, with regard to some criterion, from some set of available alternatives. It is generally divided into two subfi ...

announced they had entered into a purchase agreement to acquire WowWee Ltd, which they completed in November of that year. At the 2008 CES, several new products (including the Rovio and Femisapien) were announced with their estimated release dates and prices.

Private again; Fingerlings & Avastars

In 2010, the management of WowWee entered into a support agreement with Optimal Group, and took the company private again. In 2014, a new product, MiP, was released. It won more than 10 Tech and Toy awards, including the Toy Industry Associations’ 2015 TOTY award for Innovative Toy of the Year. MiP was also named "Innovative Toy of the Year" at the National Robotics Week. At the 2015 CES, WowWee announced products including MiPosaur and REV. In 2017, the company employed about 100 people.Corkery, Michael
"How the Fingerling Caught On (Robot Grip and All) as 2017’s Hot Toy"
''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

'', December 9, 2017 For the 2017 Christmas season, it introduced, through a series of viral promotions on social media, a product called Fingerlings. The tiny robots, in the shape of monkeys, sloths and unicorns, became one of the most popular toys of the season. Some shoppers complained that they were sold fake Fingerlings on Amazon and Walmart's websites. In 2018, WowWee followed up the success with large interactive plush Fingerlings in the Fingerlings Hugs series. in 2022 WowWee formed a partnership with the Roblox development group

Gamefam Gamefam Studios is an American video game company. Aiming to develop for the metaverse, it is the first professional company to utilize ''Roblox'' as a video game development platform and also uses '' Fortnite Creative'' and ''Minecraft''. It has ...

to launch the Avastars line of

dolls A doll is a model typically of a human or humanoid character, often used as a toy for children. Dolls have also been used in traditional religious rituals throughout the world. Traditional dolls made of materials such as clay and wood are found ...

2010 lawsuit

On November 23, 2010,

Engadget ''Engadget'' ( ) is a multilingual technology blog network with daily coverage of gadgets and consumer electronics. ''Engadget'' manages ten blogs four of which are written in English and six have international versions with independent editori ...

revealed that WowWee and a number of retailers were being sued for trademark infringement by

Gibson Guitar Corporation Gibson Brands, Inc. (formerly Gibson Guitar Corporation) is an American manufacturer of guitars, other musical instruments, and professional audio equipment from Kalamazoo, Michigan, and now based in Nashville, Tennessee. The company was forme ...

for unlawfully using the shapes of the bodies and headstocks of Gibson's signature guitars in their

Paper Jamz Paper Jamz was a collection of musical toys, produced by WowWee. Introduced in 2010, Paper Jamz were paper-thin musical toys, which included guitars, microphones, keytars, drum kits, and amplifiers. They were also marketed as "Instant Rock Star" ...

line of battery operated toy guitars. WowWee denied any wrongdoing and asserted that the shapes Gibson claimed as trademarks were generic and therefore could not function as trademarks. On November 24, 2010, the court denied Gibson's request for a temporary restraining order, but on December 22, 2010, granted Gibson's motion for a preliminary injunction. The case was later settled, with WowWee paying Gibson an undisclosed amount for licensing the likeness of Gibson guitars, according to Gibson CEO, Henry Juszkiewicz.

2022 lawsuit

In August 3, 2022, the video game company

Roblox Corporation Roblox Corporation is an American video game developer based in San Mateo, California. Founded in 2004 by David Baszucki and Erik Cassel, the company is the developer of ''Roblox'', which was released in 2006. As of December 31, 2021, Roblox C ...

sued WowWee due to the Avastars line of toys.

References

External links

*
RoboCommunity
– The official WowWee Robotics user community {{DEFAULTSORT:Wowwee Companies established in 1988 Toy companies of Hong Kong