High hopes for dancing robot toy

At first glance, it is a curious yellow blob but turn on the music and this dancing robot comes alive, bopping to your favourite tunes.

Now Wolverhampton developers of the £35 toy, which has already taken America by storm, hope it will be a must-have Christmas buy after stores including Argos and Debenhams signed up to sell it.

Richard North, founder of Wow! Stuff at Wolverhampton Science Park, said: "We know it's going to be a blockbuster and the biggest product we've ever sold.

"We've been working on it for over a year now and it reacts and picks up the beat when you play music.

"It's got microservers in it that understand the type of music you are playing and even if you click your fingers it will move in time with your fingers. "

The toy, to be sold as the My Keepon here in September, also dances to music from iPods if plugged in to its speakers.

Richard added: "Toys R Us in America took one look at it and said it was going to be the biggest toy this year and bought all of the first production line."

An estimated 2.5 million will be produced as an initial worldwide run.