Neurotech startup Paradromics completes first human brain implant, challenges Neuralink in the BCI race

Less than four months after securing strategic investment from Saudi Arabia’s Neom, Texas-based neurotech startup Paradromics announced on Monday it successfully implanted its brain-computer interface (BCI) in a human for the first time.

The procedure took place on May 14 at the University of Michigan. The patient, who was already undergoing neurosurgery for epilepsy, became the first person to receive Paradromics’ Connexus BCI. The device was implanted and removed in roughly 20 minutes during the scheduled surgery.

Paradromics Completes First Human Brain Implant

Paradromics says the test confirmed two key things: that its technology can be safely implanted in the human brain, and that it can record meaningful neural activity. For a startup that’s been around for nearly a decade, this marks a critical step into its next phase as a clinical-stage company.

The company plans to launch a clinical trial later this year, pending regulatory approval. That trial will assess the long-term safety and performance of the device in real-world use.

“We’ve shown in sheep that our device is best in class from a data and longevity standpoint, and now we’ve also shown that it’s compatible with humans,” Paradromics founder and CEO Matt Angle told CNBC. “That’s really exciting and raises a lot of excitement for our upcoming clinical trial.”

BCIs translate brain signals into commands that allow people to interact with external devices. Paradromics is targeting its technology at patients with severe motor impairments—individuals who may be unable to speak or move. The idea is that they could eventually communicate using a computer powered by their thoughts.

The Connexus system hasn’t been cleared by the FDA yet. But this early-stage success gives the company confidence as it moves toward broader testing. It also puts Paradromics in more direct competition with Neuralink, the much-hyped BCI startup founded by Elon Musk, and other emerging players like Synchron and Precision Neuroscience.

Paradromics’ approach focuses on recording brain activity at the level of individual neurons. Angle compared it to putting a microphone inside a stadium rather than outside—it picks up finer detail, not just general noise.

The procedure was part of a research collaboration between Paradromics and the University of Michigan. Dr. Oren Sagher oversaw the surgical portion, while Dr. Matthew Willsey handled the research side, including placing the BCI device, CNBC reported.

“It’s absolutely thrilling,” Willsey said, according to CNBC. “It’s motivating, and this is the kind of thing that helps me get up in the morning and go to work.”

“Neurosurgeon Matthew Willsey put a chip smaller than a penny on the patient’s brain while the person was undergoing surgery for epilepsy and left it there for 10 to 15 minutes. Needles half the diameter of a human hair poked into the brain tissue, aiming to pick up electrical signals from individual neurons,” Bloomberg wrote.

The ability for institutions to test unapproved medical devices comes through a pathway that allows research use as long as patient safety can be reasonably assured. That’s how Paradromics was able to conduct the procedure without full FDA approval.

Paradromics has raised nearly $100 million in funding, according to PitchBook, and announced a partnership with Saudi Arabia’s Neom in February. The amount of the investment wasn’t disclosed, but it signals growing interest in BCI technology beyond Silicon Valley.

For Angle, this milestone wasn’t just a technical validation—it was personal.

“You do all of these steps, you validate the hardware, you have this really high degree of rational certainty that things are going to work,” he said. “But still emotionally, when it works and when it happens the way you expected it to, it’s still very, very gratifying.”

With human testing now underway, Paradromics is stepping out of the lab and into a more competitive space—one where the implications go far beyond a proof of concept.

Paradromics is one of several companies in the race to bring BCIs to market, alongside big names like Elon Musk’s Neuralink. Earlier this month, Neuralink shared that it had implanted its technology in three human patients. Other players in the space include Precision Neuroscience and Synchron, the latter backed by Jeff Bezos and Bill Gates, both of which have also conducted human implants.