As the Colorado Inventor Showcase gears up for exhibitors this Thursday at the Cable Center in Denver, we spent some time talking with one of the event’s previous exhibitors: David McCloskey of Superstructs, a Tinker Toys-inspired building set. We also talked with Kim Wheeler of RoadNarrows, a robotics company that will be exhibiting at this year’s event.

‘Tinkering’ with a classic

From a warehouse in Erie, McCloskey ships his Superstructs all over the world, under the name WABA Fun, a moniker formed from the initials of his two sons. The former online gaming company executive found a way to adapt what he learned from 3-D modeling to the classic building construction set.

"My older brother had Tinker Toys, but they were all ruined by the time I got to them so I just had Legos," McCloskey said last week, taking a break from labeling packages for shipment.

"I wasn’t really familiar with the building system until my wife bought some for our oldest son. At the time, I was building computer games with a group out of Boulder (VR-1, now known as Circadence.) One idea led to another to incorporate some of the things we did in games with the rod-and-connector-style construction toy."

McCloskey approached Hasbro with his idea, but they weren’t interested three years ago, so he took Superstructs to market on his own, contracting with a manufacturer in China to produce the toys.

"I’m working with an incredible group. I pay a premium for it, I’m sure. I trust them so much," he said. "They’re the people who made the original Razor scooter. They only make Rollerblades and skateboards. I’m the only toy they manufacture."

Since the original patents for Tinker Toys expired decades ago, McCloskey didn’t have to worry about infringement issues and says it’s no accident that his product resembles a modern-version of the classic toy. But getting a patent for Superstructs has been a long process.

"It takes forever. You can’t just patent the use of new materials," said McCloskey, whose toys are made primarily of plastic, compared to the wooden Tinker Toys of old. "You have to patent other elements."

He has gone several rounds with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, which requested several changes during the process. (Patent office Commissioner John Doll will be the featured keynote speaker at Thursday’s Colorado Inventor Showcase.)

McCloskey, 44, has been building his one-man business every since, selling his toys nationally to such retailers as Amazon.com, TJ Maxx, Toysrus.com, Barnes & Noble and specialty shops, such as Crawdaddys Toys in Lafayette. A friend calls the company, a "mini-multinational corporation."

"Every year, I come out with new sets because the industry demands that," said McCloskey, who has sons ages 8 and 5 and a daughter, age 3.

But this year, the industry demanded something else: documenting his products to demonstrate they are safe.

"This year’s recalls are definitely no fun, having to justify my existence even though I have no magnets or chemicals or lead or paints or anything," McCloskey said.

"You show the current testing documents. Until August of this year, toy tests were valid for two years. That all changed when Mattel recalled all the toys because of lead paint," he said. "The Chinese government changed the rules and said you need to have test that are done this year in order to export anything more. That put a damper on supplies for the whole industry."

To avoid holding up any of his exports, McCloskey had all 58 components of his product retested, a process that took about a week. He plans to return to China early next year, but primarily to work on sales.

Participating in the Colorado Inventor Showcase didn’t create much of a sales boon for Superstructs, McCloskey said, but it offered a great networking experience.

"I got to meet so many of my former associates that had gone on to Ball Aerospace or places like that," he said. "Steve Spangler, of Steve Spangler Science — he’s always on television promoting how to play with your kids — I shipped products to him and his company. He was there.

And McCloskey received a "nice shiny little award" for participating.

"It was great to get the validation from the local community that I have been receiving internationally because I distribute in other parts of the world," he said. "So much of my business is international. It’s nice to feel wanted at home."

Brains for a robot world

Like SuperStructs, RoadNarrows LLC develops products that are designed to help students get excited about science. The robotics developer will be among the companies exhibiting this Thursday at the Inventor Showcase.

RoadNarrows specializes in robotic technologies for research, education and the arts. The 5-year-old company is partnering with Southern Illinois University Edwardsville and recently received a $150,000 grant from the National Science Foundation to create a "brain pack" for walking robots.

The company will be demonstrating the brain-and-sensor pack technology as well as a neural network chip, manufactured by its Chinese partner Recognetics, which Wheeler described as "a little brain on a chip." The chip’s pattern recognition application eventually will be integrated with the brain-and-sensor pack.

"There’s this whole robotics movement for schools to inspire kids to get into technology and computer science," said Kim Wheeler, CEO of the six-person company, noting that enrollment in science courses has dropped at the university level.

The company’s research team is developing open-interface standards in hardware and software for intelligent robotic applications.

"There are a lot of researchers who are doing robotics, mobile sensor networks, who need really good tools, not just toys," Wheeler said. "It’s needs to be open source. They want to write their own interface programs."

Early customers for RoadNarrows’ products will be PhD students, but when the company’s prototypes are refined, they will be geared for commercial use and for students, Wheeler said.

Via: Colorado Biz Magazine & Colorado Inventor showcase link here.