- Shanghai-based StairMed Technology disclosed a transvenous brain-computer interface designed to be positioned in about 10 minutes by threading the device through a neck vein and guiding it via the vascular system to a target site on the brain, avoiding skull-opening surgery.1
- Co-founder Zhao Zhengtuo presented the approach at the Global Health Summit in Hong Kong; Duan Wanru, a surgeon at Beijing’s Xuanwu Hospital, said a moderately skilled surgeon could complete the placement in roughly 10 minutes.2
- The device anchors itself just outside the vessel wall rather than penetrating brain tissue, using ultra-flexible electrodes reported to be about 1 micrometer thick to reduce tissue damage.1
- The endovascular program was unveiled in December 2025 in partnership with the Chinese Academy of Sciences and has so far only been tested in sheep, with human trials not yet started.3
- StairMed says it raised over RMB 1.1 billion (
$163 million) in strategic and growth funding over the prior year, including a RMB 500 million ($72.7 million) round led by Alibaba with Tencent participation, distinct from this technical/product disclosure.2
- This adds a third publicly disclosed Chinese endovascular BCI program alongside Nankai University’s June 2025 interventional human BCI first-in-human case.3
Neural Noise