Friday, November 13, 2026
RSS

InsideBCI

Brain-Computer Interface Industry News
Industry News Research Policy Opinion Market Moves
About Directory Glossary
News

Neuralink adds chronic stroke to a new US implant trial

Neuralink has registered PRIME2, a US early feasibility study of its N1 implant that adds people with chronic ischaemic stroke to those with spinal cord injury and ALS. Up to 10 participants at up to five US sites will use the implant to control a computer cursor or virtual keyboard, starting at the University of Miami. The first version of the registry entry required a stroke at least 12 months before screening with lasting weakness in the arm that was dominant before it; a version posted two days later shortened the criteria. Stroke affects far more people than the conditions Neuralink's first US trial covered.

Nov 13, 2026 · 5 min read

Market Moves

Synchron's long road to reaching the brain through a blood vessel

Synchron began with a cold email from Tom Oxley to DARPA in 2011 and a US$1 million offer to build a brain implant that travels through the veins. Fifteen years on it has put its first-generation Stentrode into ten people in Melbourne and the United States, raised US$345 million, connected its implant to Apple devices, Amazon's Alexa and OpenAI's models, and started trials of a fully wireless second-generation device. Enrolment in its US and Australian trials is paused while Synchron upgrades the hardware, and the company says it will restart once that work is finished.

Nov 13 · 14 min read

Industry News

Synchron pauses enrolment in its Stentrode trials over a problem with the implant's lead

Synchron has paused enrolment in trials of its updated, fully wireless Stentrode after a performance problem with the lead, the cable that carries signals from the Stentrode to the implanted electronics. The company says it chose to pause on its own and that no device-related safety issues have been found, and it is upgrading the whole system before restarting. WIRED reported that Synchron is also cutting jobs and scaling back in New York while building a San Diego team for a new device. Separately, the registry entry for its Canadian study lists it as terminated in September for insufficient recruitment.

Nov 13 · 4 min read

Market Moves

Chinese startup Junrou raises nearly RMB 100 million for brain electrodes steered by magnets

Junrou Technology, founded in 2025 by Liu Zhiyuan of the Shenzhen Institutes of Advanced Technology, has closed an angel-plus round of nearly RMB 100 million led by Shunwei Capital, with GL Ventures, humanoid robot maker AgiBot and Nansha Qisheng following. The company is commercialising NeuroWorm, a soft fibre electrode published in Nature in September 2025 that can be steered through tissue by an external magnet. It plans an investigator-initiated clinical study in 2027, starting with epilepsy and depression, and has also developed electronic skin for robot hands.

Nov 12 · 4 min read

Research

Chinese researchers' gel electrode keeps a brain-signal cap working for 14 hours at rest

Researchers from Guangxi University, Guangxi Medical University and Tsinghua University have built a hydrogel EEG electrode that is soft against the scalp and firm where it meets the circuit. Fitted into a commercial EEG cap, it recorded stable brain signals for more than 14 hours at rest and more than 8 hours during free movement, with typing by brain signal above 94% accurate over the long recordings. The paper appeared in npj Flexible Electronics on 31 October 2026.

Nov 10 · 3 min read

Market Moves

ARK Invest files to launch a BCI and surgical robotics ETF

ARK ETF Trust filed a preliminary prospectus with the US Securities and Exchange Commission on 6 November 2026 for 14 thematic ETFs, including the ARK Brain Computer Interfaces & Surgical Robotics ETF, an actively managed fund that would gain exposure primarily through total return swaps and may hold private and restricted securities.

Nov 8 · 3 min read

Market Moves

China BCI funding and IPO tracker 2026

The 2026 financing rounds and listing steps by Chinese brain-computer interface companies verified by InsideBCI, from BrainCo's RMB 2 billion round to Neuracle's STAR Market application, with amounts, lead investors and sources. Updated as new rounds are announced.

Nov 8 · 6 min read

Policy & Regulation

Brain-wearable makers left AI training on users' brain data out of their privacy policies, Science finds

A yearlong Science investigation published on 4 and 5 November 2026 found that, at first, none of the consumer neurotechnology companies building brain foundation models had disclosed it in their privacy policies, that Interaxon trained a model on about 50,000 hours of Muse users' EEG data, and that a Chinese company gives traffic police real-time access to truck drivers' brain-wave data.

Nov 7 · 6 min read

Policy & Regulation

RAND Europe report urges rules for brain-computer interfaces in workplaces, schools and the military

A report by RAND Europe and the Brussels think tank Centre for Future Generations, released on 2 November 2026 and funded by the Open Society Foundations, finds that no brain-computer interface on sale has yet shown robust enhancement beyond normal human ability in real-world conditions, and recommends regulating the devices by where and how they are used, with a right to refuse them.

Nov 7 · 4 min read