Tesla Inc TSLA CEO Elon Musk-led brain-machine interface startup said on Thursday it has secured $205 million in fresh funding — its largest so far.
What Happened: The Series C-funding round — considered an early-stage investment — was led by tech-based venture capital firm Vy Capital and also saw participation from Alphabet Inc’s GOOG GOOGL Google Ventures.
The San Francisco, California-based startup said it will use the funds from the round to take Neuralink’s first product to market and accelerate the research and development of future products.
Musk has long been claiming the need to combine mind and machine, in order to prevent human beings from being overtaken by artificial intelligence. If successful, connecting the brain with computers could also help cure neurological conditions including Alzheimer’s, dementia and back injuries.
Earlier this year, Musk released a video showing a macaque monkey intent on playing a video game only by using thought, thanks to a neural implant allowing him to move the well-known “vintage” Pong game bars with its mind. The next step is human trials.
See Also: 50 Facts And Figures About Elon Musk On His 50th Birthday
Why It Matters: Neuralink is not alone and competition in the field is intense. New York-based Synchron said this week that it has received the Food and Drug Administration's approval to run a clinical trial with human patients, beating out ace rival Neuralink.
Syncron aims to implant a tiny device in the brain to allow paralyzed patients to operate digital devices such as computer cursors with their thoughts.
Neuralink aims to do something similar. It has spent the last four years building the first high channel count brain-machine interface intended for therapeutic use in patients.
“Our first product, the N1 Link, is a 1024 channel device that, once implanted, is completely invisible and transmits data via a wireless connection,” the startup said in a statement.
This device, it said, is intended to help quadriplegics regain their digital freedom by allowing them to interact with their computers or phones in high bandwidth and naturalistic way.
Price Action: Tesla shares closed 4.69% higher at $677.35 on Thursday.
Photo by Steve Jurvetson on Wikimedia
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