Dave the Funky Shoulder Monkey a must for Christmas

Toy shops around the world are going bananas for a cuddly robot monkey invented by a team of boffins in Wolverhampton.

Dave the Funky Shoulder Monkey is on track to become the big must-have toy on sale this Christmas, which should mean a multi-million pound seasonal windfall for Richard North and his team of inventors and designers at Wow!Stuff, based on the city's science park.

They have come up with a string of toy ideas in recent years but Dave could be their biggest seller yet, with company sales set to double to £160 million this year. Mr North said: "This really puts us on the radar for the big stores, both here in the UK and internationally."

The firm has just had to open up a third factory in China, where the toys are made, to cope with demand for 450,000 of the cute remote-controlled black and white robot, based on a Capuchin monkey.

Dave can be clipped to clothing and will laugh, cry, burp, wave and even, being a monkey, scratch himself.

He is already on the Toys R Us list of predicted top sellers in the UK this Christmas and is also seen on the "most-wanted" list for iconic London toy store Hamleys.

Mr North said there was also huge interest from Toys R Us in the USA.

Former Regis School pupil Richard, 43, who launched the business with fellow directors Kenny McAndrew and Dr Graeme Taylor, said: "We started off designing and developing gifts for other companies to supply to UK retailers five years ago, but then moved into the toy industry and have grown massively, expanding internationally.

"All of our products are manufactured abroad, but all the design and development work happens here in Wolverhampton. We created Dave working with our team of new product development engineers, three of whom have a PhD in robotics."

The firm's first big success was a palm-sized radio-controlled helicopter, followed by a string of Top Gear products.