- Tiger Electronics should not be confused with the appliance maker Tiger Corporation, the electronics retailer Tiger Direct, or the producer of Gizmondo, Tiger Telematics.
Tiger Electronics is an American toy manufacturer, best known for its handheld LCD games, the Furby, and Giga Pets. Randy Rissman and Roger Shiffman founded the company in 1978. It started with low-tech items like phonographs, but then began developing handheld electronic games and teaching toys. It achieved success with many simple handheld electronics games like "Electronic Bowling" and other titles based on licenses, such as "Robocop", "Terminator", and "Spider-Man". An early 90's hit was the variable speed portable cassette/microphone combo Talkboy (seen in the 1992 movie Home Alone 2), followed by the Brain Warp. It also licensed the "Lazer Tag" brand from its inventors, Shoot the Moon Productions, which was born from the remnants of the Worlds of Wonder company. Tiger also produced a version of Lights Out around 1995. In 1997 it also produced a quaint fishing game called Fishing Championship, in the shape of a reduced fishing rod. Tiger has made two cartridge based systems. The first and less technically sophisticated was known as the R-Zone. It employed red LCD cartridges, which were projected via backlight onto a reflective screen that covered one of the player's eyes. All R-Zone games were adapted from existing Tiger handheld LCDs. The second was the game.com handheld system, which was meant to compete with Nintendo's Game Boy and boasted such novel features as a touchscreen and limited Internet connectivity. Ultimately, it was a failure, with only 20 games produced.
Tiger Electronics has been part of the Hasbro toy company since 1998. Hasbro, previously shy of high-tech toys, was very interested in the development of the cuddly "Furby". With Hasbro's support, Tiger was able to rush through the development process and get the Furby on the shelves for the 1998 holiday season, during which it was a runaway hit -- the "it" toy of the 1998 and 1999 seasons. Tiger also created the Giga Pets line of handheld electronic "pets" to compete with the popular Japanese Tamagotchi. The company has since become one of the most prominent producers of electronic toys, chosen to produce toys based on a wide variety of licenses, including Star Trek, Star Wars, Barney, Arthur, Winnie the Pooh, Franklin the Turtle, Neopets, Wheel of Fortune, Jeopardy!, Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? and many more. In 2000, Tiger was licensed to provide a variety of electronics with the Yahoo! brand name, including digital cameras, webcams, and a "Hits Downloader" that made music from the Internet (mp3s, etc.) accessible through Tiger's assorted "Hit Clips" players. Tiger also produces the VideoNow personal video player, the VCamNow digital camcorder, and the ChatNow line of kid-oriented two-way radios. The continuing development of Furby-type technology has led to the release of the "FurReal" line of toys in 2003.
