While most of the venture world is chasing AI deals, Max Hodak — the co-founder and former president of Neuralink — is working on a startup that he claims is on the verge of becoming the first brain-computer interface company to bring a product to market.
These allegations did not go unnoticed. Hodak startup, Science Corporationsaid Wednesday morning that it raised $230 million in a Series C funding round. A source close to the startup says the round gave Science Corp a post-money valuation of $1.5 billion.
In the short term, Science Corp. bet PREMIUMa chip said to be smaller than a grain of rice that, when implanted in the eye, works with camera-equipped glasses to restore functional vision to people with advanced macular degeneration.
The startup hasn’t fully developed the technology itself: It bought PRIMA’s assets in 2024 from the French company Pixium Vision, improved it and completed the tests that Pixium had started.
But the clinical results that Science has produced since then are its own. In trials involving 47 patients across Europe and the US, 80% showed significant improvement in visual acuity and were able to read letters, numbers and words, the company says.
“To my knowledge, this is the first time that restoration of reading fluency has ever been conclusively demonstrated in blind patients,” Hodak told TechCrunch in an interview in December. The boot device has also done the cover of Time magazine.
It is unclear when PRIMA will be available to patients, but the regulatory path is shaping up. Science Corp. has applied for a CE mark for the implant in the European Union and says it expects approval in mid-2026, after which it will launch the product on the continent. It claims this timeline would make it the first BCI company with a product on the market.
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The company told TechCrunch that Germany is likely to be its first market, as the country has created pathways to provide early access to new medical technologies. In the US, regulatory discussions with the FDA are “ongoing”, the startup said.
Science Corp. is also expanding its PRIMA trial program to include Stargardt disease and retinitis pigmentosa, inherited retinal diseases that are leading causes of vision loss in young adults.
The new capital will be used to fund the commercialization of PRIMA, as well as support the startup’s broader research portfolio. This includes a biohybrid neural interface program that involves growing engineered neurons from stem cells in a waffle-like device that sits on the surface of the brain and forms biological connections with existing neural circuits.
There is also a new line of business in Science called Vessel: an instrument maintenance platform that aims to develop micro perfusion technology so that instruments can be carried on commercial flights or maintained by patients at home rather than in ICU suites.
Investors in the Series C include a mix of new and older backers, including Lightspeed Venture Partners, Khosla Ventures, Y Combinator and Quiet Capital. IQT, the nonprofit investment firm that focuses on solutions that can be used by government agencies such as the FBI and CIA, also invested.
The round raises Science Corp’s total funding. to $490 million. The startup currently employs 150 people.
Update: This story originally reflected the company’s pre-money rather than post-money valuation.
