Dinosaur set to hatch in Taiwan

Taiwanese firms are playing an important role in the "hatching" of Pleo, a robotic dinosaur pet which is expected to stomp its way into the hearts of children and adults alike.

"The Pleo's egg was laid in the US, but it will hatch in Taiwan," Max Fang (方國健), chairman of Maxima Capital Management Inc (麥實國際管理顧問), told a press conference yesterday.

Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密), the nation's top manufacturer of electronic parts, and Maxima, a Taipei-based venture capital firm, have each committed an investment of NT$100 million (US$3.1 million) in California-based Ugobe Inc to help produce the Pleo -- a green and brown dinosaur capable of expressing emotions such as wagging its tail when it is happy and stomping its feet when angry.

Without solid funding, good ideas and excellent prototypes are not enough to ensure mass market production, Fang said.

Hon Hai has been selected as one of the assemblers, along with Hong Kong's Jetta Co (鎮泰), because of its reputation for quality and capability to lower costs, he said.

"The power of relationships in Asia never ceases to amaze me," Ugobe chief operating executive Bob Christopher said yesterday about the company's link with Taiwanese firms.

Christopher said that he was introduced to Fang in May last year by a high-level executive from Softbank China Venture Capital, then later approached Hon Hai via Fang.

Ugobe expects an overwhelming response to the new robotic toy, which is expected to debut in March next year.

First-batch volumes will be around 1,000 units at specific retailers in the US, UK, Taiwan or Hong Kong, Christopher said.

More than 100,000 Pleos will be hitting the world's stores next year, with a price tag of US$249 to US$299, he added.

Christopher said that Pleo has six central processing units made by Japan's Toshiba Corp and uses cameras produced by Taiwan's Sunplus Technology Co (凌陽科技).

The Pleo runs on an open source operating system, which will enable owners to program it to become exactly the type of pet that they want.

A result of four years of development work, the Pleo is meant to resemble a one-week old North American Camarasaurus from the Jurassic period, also known as the Chambered Lizard, and its design is derived from fossils of the original dinosaur.

"Pleo proves that technology can be used to show emotions," said the robot animal's creator, Caleb Chung, who helped create the Furby in 1998.

More than 50 million units of the robotic Furby has been sold around the world, generating more than US$1.2 billion in sales, the company said.