Imation Debuts Npower CE Brand For Kids

OAKDALE, MINN. — Imation made good on its promise to extend its portfolio beyond storage by launching a lineup of CE products under its new Npower brand.

The lineup will consist of roughly 20 SKUs bearing characters from Nickelodeon. It will include an LCD TV, DVD player, digital cameras, a digital photo frame and MP3 and portable media players.

The product line was in development by Memcorp and Nickelodeon and was continued after Imation purchased Memcorp in July, said Steve Moss, Imation's chief marketing officer. The goal, Moss said, was to create a line of "true consumer electronics" for kids, particularly the 8- to 11-year-old demographic that are aware of CE products but not yet owners.

While individual dealers will determine merchandizing, Imation sees the products as consumer electronics and not toys. "We want to be with the MP3 players, not the in toy aisle," Moss said.

The products will be on store shelves by October. Best Buy, Toys "R" Us and Target will carry the full line while Walmart.com will carry Dora the Explorer and Go, Diego Go! digital cameras.

In video, SpongeBob SquarePants will grace a 15-inch LCD TV and a progressive-scan DVD player. The LCD features a tuner, remote control and a suggested retail of $249. The $59.99 DVD player can also play MP3 files.

In digital imaging, Npower digital cameras and photo frames will feature Dora the Explorer, Diego and SpongeBob SquarePants designs. The cameras will be bundled with Nickelodeon Flash Photo Tools imaging software for customizing photos with Nickelodeon characters and designs. The $59.99 Flash Jr. Rugged camera, available in Dora the Explorer and Diego designs, features bilingual phrases and sound effects.

The SpongeBob SquarePants model offers a built-in USB plug to connect the camera directly to a computer. It will retail for $21.99. For $39.99, the SpongeBob Flash VGA-resolution camera features 8MB of internal memory and adhesive skins. The 1.3-megapixel model ($49.99) packs a 1.1-inch color LCD, and 32MB of internal memory.

SpongeBob will also grace a 3-megapixel digital camera with a 1.5-inch color LCD, 32MB of internal memory, an SD card slot and a suggested retail of $79.99.

Imation will also offer a 7-inch digital frame in the Npower line-up. The In-Vision frame, for a suggested $99.99, accepts SD memory cards and features 128MB of internal memory.

In portable media players, SpongeBob SquarePants and The Naked Brothers Band will grace Npower music and video players. The Fission MP3 player can store up to 500 MP3 or WMA files and has a 10 hour rechargeable battery. It also has an SD card slot for memory expansion and can shake with the music. Suggested retails for both are $49.99 each.

A Fusion portable media player will offer the same character choices as the Fission that supports photo viewing, game playing, digital audio and video playback and accepts content downloads from Nickelodeon's Npower Web site and has an SD card slot. The suggested retail is $99.99.

Imation will also offer SD memory cards preloaded with audio ($14.99) or video ($16.99) content for use in the Fission and Fusion players.

A portable CD player in Dora and Diego designs will retail for a suggested $24.99, and a SpongeBob alarm clock ($29.99) is also part of the line.