The conversation, the dream and the reality of shaking the toy industry

What started as a conversation over dinner with family, became a dream, and grew into a business that has a clear potential (and is on track) of hitting a multi-hundred-million-dollar mark in 3 years. 

Let me share with you the conversation, the dream and the current reality. 

It began when I tried to take away my three-year-old’s iPad and he started shedding crocodile tears. I stood there undecided, should I play a bad cop or a good cop?

The world, as it was when we were kids, is long gone. Instead of paper cup phones, our children use actual mobile phones in their pretend-play sessions. They play video games on tablets and watch cartoons on laptops or smart TVs. And taking away these "screens" is almost never easy. 

I sat down with Dinesh, a longtime friend and batch-mate from IIT Kharagpur. His son is 6 years old, and he was much ahead of me in the vicious circle of finding balanced and meaningful ways of early learning and engagement. After a lot of discussions, it hit us. What if we redesign "screen time" with more hands-on activities (both educational and recreational)? Can we create a screen time that parents would happily allow their kids, a screen time that is productive and plays a much bigger role in a kid’s life than mere entertainment?

Like most entrepreneurs, our search for light was long. We spent weeks exploring solutions, working different permutations of the latest technology trends. At last, we found our answers in Augmented Reality. 

Thus, PlayShifu was born. Dinesh Advani and I, Vivek Goyal, turned ourselves into toymakers and ‘started-up’ with AR powered educational experiences. We managed to put together a team who were passionate about the idea and aligned with our vision—techies, innovators, educators, and above all highly creative individuals.

Back in 2016, we first launched a collection of AR flashcards ranging from wildlife to space. And within a year, we launched Shifu Orboot, a one-of-its-kind smart globe. 

To the naked eye, Orboot looks like any other regular globe. But when seen through a mobile/tablet, it “magically” comes to life. We packed Orboot with layers of enriching information on countries, cultures, cuisines, monuments, wildlife and hundreds of other fun facts. You can literally take a virtual tour of the world at the comfort of your homes. We wanted to hear “wow” from kids around the world. And guess what? We did.

Orboot, via Kickstarter, opened the doors of international markets for us. Backers from over 60 countries received their Orboots, and almost 50% of them wrote back to us the same day, lauding the experience Orboot presents. They expressed their profound felicity watching their kids fall in love with Orboot almost instantly. And this is proven by off-the-charts engagement we are observing with Orboot. Being a play experience driven by iPad, we are able to gather few details of play and progression via analytics, and we use that to upgrade the features which were already most loved.

The first iteration gave us the motivation to keep going, and we were determined to reach a broader audience. The scale at which we envisioned to expand, required us to be on the ground, scouting and networking. 

In the last two years, we have attended prominent toy fairs and tech events all over the world. We have travelled to Nuremberg, New York, Hong Kong for international toy fairs and Las Vegas for the mammoth innovation-centric Consumer Electronics Show (CES), showcasing our beloved range of products to people.

Nuremberg's Spielwarenmesse is the largest toy fair in the world. It brings together over 70,000 people from the toy industry, both creators and buyers, from Europe, Asia and the Middle East. Hong Kong beckons Asian tech enthusiasts in the numbers of ~55,000. The New York Toy Fair attracts the biggest toy market in the world, from North America and South America with close to 40,000 attendees in total.

Consumer Electronic Show (CES), Las Vegas, is a whole different story. People visit Vegas every January to get a glimpse of the future. This year, a whopping 200,000 patrons made it, to get a glimpse into the products that hold the potential to redefine the future; as we know it.

Besides the priceless experience of witnessing some sought-after toys and products in action, first-hand, we grabbed every opportunity to showcase our products and pitch our ideas. Shifu Orboot, and our latest product, Shifu Plugo, were a major hit. 

Shifu Plugo is a series of “phygital” (physical+digital) toys that makes STEM super fun. Plugo is a far bigger initiative than any of our previous projects. With Plugo, we have designed a combination of physical and digital interaction, unlike any other in the world, that engages all the human senses. Imagine acquiring engineering, math, science, tech and art skills while playing video games! That’s Plugo for you, in a nutshell. 

What these world-class events held in store for us is tremendous. Attendees include teachers, parents, innovators, retailers, distributors, media, and lots and lots of potential partners in huge numbers. It is a gold mine for seeking business opportunities. Safe to say that we did some good business here! To top it all off, journalists loved our products and pegged Orboot and Plugo as ‘trending toys to watch out for in 2019’. Being featured by Forbes, CNET, Mirror, Fox11, NBC, and TechCrunch added feathers to our cap.

We met some amazing people who are now friends, backers, partners, influencers, and investors that support our idea of innovation that we aspire to bring through PlayShifu. 

But the road hasn't always been smooth. It was full of anticipated challenges, and unforeseen ones. We have managed to steer through the rough water of entrepreneurship with the help of some incredible people, who we had the chance to work with. I will share all the fresh new developments of the toy world in the upcoming articles.

The global toy market was worth $89 billion in 2017 and is projected to hit $140 billion by 2025 with Brazil, China, and India being the biggest drivers. We are determined to disrupt this industry with our in-house technology stack and focus on innovation.

This is just the beginning of our "toy story” (the entrepreneurial edition). See you around the corner.