Disney's next big iPad app? There are toy cars for that. The entertainment company has unveiled a new range of physical toys called Appmates, which will be used to interact with apps on Apple's tablet.

The first Disney brand to get the Appmates treatment is Pixar's Cars. There will be six toy cars sold in packs of one or two for £12.99 and £19.99 respectively, which go on sale in October. They will be sold in Disney's physical stores and on its website, as well as in Apple's real-world and online stores.

The companion iPad app will be free to download. It includes a mode for children who don't own one of the physical toys (or at least don't have one to hand).

"We've been working on this exciting new technology that really brings together the physical world and the app and tablet world," says Jeff Jones, vice president and general manager for digital games for Disney's european division. "They have a capacitive footprint, so when you put them onto the tablet, it recognises what the toy is, where it's positioned and what direction it's pointing in."

Children drive the cars around the virtual Radiator Springs world by pinching the two front windows with their thumb and finger to complete the conductive circuit. They can explore, stop by characters from the Cars movies to talk and get missions, and take part in races. Buying more toy cars opens up new areas of the world, while additional levels will also be released in the coming months, bought by the parent through Apple's in-app payments system.

Jones says that Disney plans to use the technology for other Appmates products and apps in the future. "The first product launch is with Cars, but this could work with a whole range of our characters and stories," he says.

"We will have lots more coming out. A lot of development work has gone into this, and we have patents pending on the technology behind it. From a business point of view, it has been an exciting challenge to get the physical product made in China and shipped into the UK alongside the app going live in Apple's App Store."

Appmates' October launch is for North America and the UK, with other European countries to follow once the app has been fully localised.

Andrew Woolnough, creative director for Disney's European boys, outdoor and consumer electronics division, says the app is deliberately more open-ended than a standard game. "It's an open environment, more like a virtual world than a linear track," he says. "Children can explore that world and then make decisions on what they want to do. It's also more like a traditional toy play-mat in that sense."

Disney is not the only company exploring these kinds of peripherals. Earlier in 2011, Griffin Technology released Crayola ColorStudio HD, a free iPad drawing app for children with its own £24.99 crayon-shaped accessory. As with the Appmates Cars app, ColorStudio HD could be used without buying the peripheral if parents balked at the cost.

Disney's cars are likely to sell well this Christmas: think of all those iPad-owning parents milling around Apple Stores. Having a physical product from a famous film franchise on real-world retail shelves also gives Disney an advantage at a time when discovery on the App Store is a problem for many developers, and even big brands.

The potential downside? The cars are necessarily small: woe betide any parent who allows them to be left at a friend's house, lost in the depths of a toy box or flung out of a car window by a mischievous toddler. Although that could be said of many toys, app-linked or not.

Appmates is Disney's latest apps initiative, following the release of a succession of games, book-apps and other applications for children. Not all are based on its big brands either. Original iOS game Where's My Water? is currently topping App Store charts around the world.

"We have a split strategy," says Jones. "We are working with these great characters and franchises that we have, but we are also looking for apps and games to be a source of new franchises that can work across Disney. There is a two-way path from digital games to the rest of the business."