K-One Seals Deal With US Firm To Make Smart Pen

Thursday April 16, 2009 - MESDAQ-LISTED company K-One Technology Bhd (0111) expects to boost its income with a deal to design and manufacture a digital pen.

The deal, which was signed yesterday, is with US-based Livescribe, and K-One will spend some RM1 million to develop the Pulse Smartpen.



"The smart pen produced by K-One will be distributed worldwide, not confined to the local market," K-One group chairman Edwin Lim Beng Fook told reporters at a briefing in Petaling Jaya.

Since its launch in April last year, California-based Livescribe has sold over 100,000 units of the smart pen globally, said Livescribe founder and chief executive officer Jim Marggraff.
K-One is currently the authorised distributor for the pen in Asean, Oceania and Middle East markets.

The pen is essentially combined with an audio recorder. This means that users don't have to worry they may miss writing something during a meeting, for example.

The product now retails at RM599 for the one-gigabyte memory version and RM799 for the two-gigabyte version.

Marggraff said the volume of the smart pen to be produced locally will depend on the performance of K-One and the acceptance of the smart pen from the government, education and business community in Malaysia.