Mousr, a robotic cat toy, might be even more fun than the real thing.
Mousr, a robotic cat toy, may be even more fun than the real thing.
The price may seem a bit steep for another cat toy that’s just going to lie around on the floor doing nothing. But hey, isn’t your cat worth it? That $149 buys a robotic cat toy with artificial intelligence and its very own app.
Petronics introduced Mousr, its smarter-than-most-robotic-cat-toys, at Global Pet Expo last spring and left the event with high honors. It won both the American Pet Product Association’s Best New Cat Product Award for 2018 and the Fear Free Best Cat Enrichment Product award.
Playing Cat And (Robotic) Mouse
Before they developed Mousr, Petronics founders David Jun, Michael Friedman and Dave Cohen noticed something about cats. Most love to play with their humans, mainly because humans move the toys around and bring them to life. But those robotic cat toys? They get so boring so fast.
So the three cat-loving electrical engineers tried to think like a cat. And a mouse.
Their robotic cat toy is loaded with sensors, a speaker so it can squeak like a mouse and interchangeable string and bounce tails to match the cat’s style of play. It can scoot across the floor at a speedy 12 miles per hour and either struggle or play dead when the cat catches it. It has three automatic play strategies: open wander, wall hugger and stationary.
You can play along using the app on your smart phone. Or let your cat be a solitary hunter and entertain himself.
But Seriously, This Robot Is More Than A Toy
As if developing what sounds like a really fun robotic cat toy wasn’t enough, Petronics has National Science Foundation backing to look at additional uses for its lightweight autonomous robot technology. One thought is a tiny, unobtrusive personal assistant that could wander around the house checking on elderly family members or kids.
Even that could be entertaining for cats.
For now, Mousr is available just on the Petronics website and Amazon. Even if you don’t have $149 to spend on a cat toy at the moment, you really have to go to Amazon to watch the customer videos for your daily dose of cuteness overload.
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