Someone more knowledgeable than I can comment on starting kids on three-string guitars, but I find this collaboration with Apple Corps on a Beatles-themed line of kids’ guitars interesting.
Their gutars are $150 without the Beatles stickers so it seems like a gimick to sell guitars and make an extra &100.
If you’re referencing the electric, the regular one is $179, not $149, and the Beatles version comes with a strap, picks, and a lot of other stuff. So not quite as bad as you allege.
Edit: Actually, their “non-Beatles” electric models range from $179 to $249.
Here’s one of our members who is not a kid, but is successfully learning to play using a Loog guitar.
Looks a good idea to me, but it might be a short lived source of interest due to the lack of strings. They aren’t inexpensive, you can get a very decent guitar suitable for a youngster for the same price so it would need to be thought about very carefully.
To me the Fender versions could be a better choice.