A toy helicopter created from cannibalized smartphones was among the main attractions at a huge toy show in Tokyo yesterday, where producers were targeting the young and the young-at-heart.
The motor that makes a mobile phone vibrate powers the rotor blades on the Nano-Falcon, which its makers say is the world’s smallest radio-controlled helicopter.
The 6.5cm machine weighs just 11g, has a range of just 5m and can fly for five minutes, but its makers say they are feeding the fantasies of adults who never really grew up.
Photo: EPA
“Japan’s aging population made us think of developing a toy targeting adults,” said Naoki Nakagawa, head of sales at maker CCP.
“Ten or twenty years ago, helicopter toys could cost a lot of money. Those who couldn’t afford it at the time can now make their childhood dream come true at a reasonable price,” Nakagawa said.
The mini machine retails at around ¥4,700 (US$50), a price company spokeswoman Kiyoko Hayasaki said came from its use of bits of mobile phones.
“We were able to set the price at this relatively cheap level because we took some key parts from stocks that are widely available in the market for smartphones,” she said.
Elsewhere at the exhibition, toymakers were showcasing tablet computers specifically for small children.
“Children like to emulate what adults do, and a survey said 90 percent of tablet computer users let their children use their tablets,” said Yuki Itagaki, a spokeswoman for MegaHouse, a subsidiary of major Japanese toy maker Bandai Namco Holdings.
MegaHouse’s “tap me” is a tablet specifically developed for use by children aged between four and eight, with built-in parental controls, including a timer that limits use.
Despite its price tag of ¥20,790, MegaHouse aims to sell 100,000 “tap mes” in the coming 12 months.
US toy maker Mattel Inc was showing off its Apptivity Monkey, a fluffy monkey designed to hold Apple Inc’s iPhone — and protect it from over-enthusiastic toddlers, who can press buttons on the creature’s limbs to create music.
Japan’s Takara Tomy has a stand for the iPhone that dances along to the music it is playing.
The International Tokyo Toy Show ends tomorrow at Tokyo Big Sight in the Japanese capital’s bay area, with today and tomorrow open to the public.
Among the rows of vibrators, rubber torsos and leather harnesses at a Chinese sex toys exhibition in Shanghai this weekend, the beginnings of an artificial intelligence (AI)-driven shift in the industry quietly pulsed. China manufactures about 70 percent of the world’s sex toys, most of it the “hardware” on display at the fair — whether that be technicolor tentacled dildos or hyper-realistic personalized silicone dolls. Yet smart toys have been rising in popularity for some time. Many major European and US brands already offer tech-enhanced products that can enable long-distance love, monitor well-being and even bring people one step closer to
Malaysia’s leader yesterday announced plans to build a massive semiconductor design park, aiming to boost the Southeast Asian nation’s role in the global chip industry. A prominent player in the semiconductor industry for decades, Malaysia accounts for an estimated 13 percent of global back-end manufacturing, according to German tech giant Bosch. Now it wants to go beyond production and emerge as a chip design powerhouse too, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said. “I am pleased to announce the largest IC (integrated circuit) Design Park in Southeast Asia, that will house world-class anchor tenants and collaborate with global companies such as Arm [Holdings PLC],”
Sales in the retail, and food and beverage sectors last month continued to rise, increasing 0.7 percent and 13.6 percent respectively from a year earlier, setting record highs for the month of March, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday. Sales in the wholesale sector also grew last month by 4.6 annually, mainly due to the business opportunities for emerging applications related to artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing technologies, the ministry said in a report. The ministry forecast that retail, and food and beverage sales this month would retain their growth momentum as the former would benefit from Tomb Sweeping Day
Thousands of parents in Singapore are furious after a Cordlife Group Ltd (康盛人生集團), a major operator of cord blood banks in Asia, irreparably damaged their children’s samples through improper handling, with some now pursuing legal action. The ongoing case, one of the worst to hit the largely untested industry, has renewed concerns over companies marketing themselves to anxious parents with mostly unproven assurances. This has implications across the region, given Cordlife’s operations in Hong Kong, Macau, Indonesia, the Philippines and India. The parents paid for years to have their infants’ cord blood stored, with the understanding that the stem cells they contained