Wednesday, May 24, 2017

Disney Accelerator Link Pays Off Again With Lightning McQueen Toy

A link, first forged at the Disney Accelerator in Burbank, has paid off for robotic toy developer Sphero, with another Disney-themed toy for the Disney Accelerator graduate. Sphero has rolled out a new, robotic toy, the Ultimate Lightning McQueen race car, a smartphone-controlled, animatronic, talking toy based on the Disney charger of the same name. The new robotic car, which costs $299.99, features animated eyes and mouth, a "emotive" suspension which mimics the movements of the Disney Cars' character, and can even follow "scripts" to re-enact scenes from the movie. The Ultimate Lightning McQueen will even sit and watch the Disney-Pixar Cars movie, and make comments in real time on movie scenes. The car is a continued result of a link first forged in Burbank between Disney and Sphero, which was a participant in the company's first accelerator program, which was being run at the time by Techstars. The introduction between Sphero and Disney's Bob Iger resulted in the immensely successful BB-8 robotic toy built by Sphero.

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