In-Depth | Capital "Frenzy" for Old Stocks in Brain-Computer Interface! Inquiry prices continue to rise, with frequent premiums appearing

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Capital from all directions is rushing to snap up brain-computer interface (BCI) projects.

“Not long ago, around 10 funds that proactively approached us seeking to transfer shares from Qiangnao Technology were all top-tier institutions, and we also politely declined many,” said Liu Dan, one of Qiangnao Technology’s early investors and a well-known investor in the life sciences sector, in an interview with Securities Times reporter. “And the price kept rising through the inquiry process—there were even expressions of interest at a higher level than the price of the newly issued capital.”

In the primary market, trading of existing shares is typically offered at a discount compared with newly issued shares. The unusual transfer market for existing shares in BCI—reflects this sector’s unprecedented investment and financing heat: industrial capital and internet tech giants have moved in one after another. However, the reporter learned in interviews that while capital is scrambling for BCI projects, different investors place different emphasis on different technical routes.

“BCI companies can basically raise funds quickly”

BCIs have been included in the future industries in this year’s government work report, and combined with technical breakthroughs such as the approval for the listing of the world’s first Class III invasive brain-computer interface medical device, China’s BCI primary-market investment has entered a “DeepSeek moment.”

On March 13, JieTi Medical, a BCI star startup, announced the completion of a strategic financing of RMB 500 million (5亿元), and within the past year the company’s cumulative financing amount exceeded RMB 1.1 billion (11亿元); on March 12, Formata Technology announced the completion of a RMB 150 million (1.5亿元) angel round financing, setting a new record for the highest angel round financing in China’s BCI sector; in January, Qiangnao Technology completed another round of approximately RMB 2 billion (20亿元) financing, setting a domestic single-transaction financing record in the non-invasive BCI field.

IT Juzi data shows that as of March 19, within the year there were 17 investment and financing events in the BCI sector, totaling RMB 3.803 billion (38.03亿元), far exceeding the RMB 1.455 billion (14.55亿元) financing scale for all of 2025.

Liu Dan said that under this level of heat, startups whose founding teams have some foundational knowledge of the BCI industry are basically all being courted, thereby obtaining rapid financing. More importantly, the sub-sector leading companies have become the main targets for mainstream funds “to plug gaps.” “Some top funds have entered the track through methods such as acquiring existing shares.”

Tangent Investment is one of the lead investors in Formata Technology’s angel round financing. Its partner Lin Zhencheng told the reporter that this round of financing has advanced quickly and obtained oversubscription, and there are currently multiple other institutions chasing to invest in the subsequent rounds. “BCI has become the focus of investment and financing in the medical sector. We started researching and laying out this track two years ago, and have already invested in four or five projects, and there are another two or three projects to invest in later.” he said.

In this round of BCI primary-market investment and financing boom, the first place where capital flows is still top companies. Large-scale financings are mostly concentrated in firms with high technical barriers and fast clinical advancement. Mao Shuo, executive director of Qiming Venture Capital, said in an interview with the reporter that institutions generally favor four types of targets: companies with hard-core technology, especially those with clear core advantages in implantable and flexible BCI technologies; founding teams that combine top academic backgrounds with industrialization capabilities; leading clinical progress that can advance formative verification and clinical trials, with clear approval and commercialization pathways; and those with clear deployment scenarios in areas such as movement decoding and treatment for neurological diseases.

This is also why Qiming Venture Capital has been investing in JieTi Medical. “The JieTi Medical founding team has extremely strong professionalism and growth potential. It has developed China’s first miniaturized implantable, flexible BCI system, completed a series of strict preclinical validations, and is also actively driving the formation of industry standards and approval pathways.” Mao Shuo said. “We see a clear future vision in JieTi Medical. It has already completed the first clinical implantation for movement decoding in China, and has also defined clear technical routes in areas such as language decoding, visual reconstruction, and fine-tuned control for neurological diseases.”

BCI component and materials companies have also become a segment track for capital allocation. Yang Bo, managing director of ShuiMu WuTong Venture Capital, told the reporter that companies such as flexible electrodes for invasive BCIs, signal processing systems, chips, and implantable devices—with relatively high technical thresholds—are favored by capital.

Industrial capital and internet tech giants move in one after another

During this round’s BCI financing boom, the participating parties have become more diversified. Yang Bo observed that earlier, China’s BCI industry was mostly a frontier niche track that only a handful of medical device funds and hard-tech funds paid attention to. Now it has entered the view of more comprehensive funds, industrial capital, local state-owned capital, and internet tech giants.

Among Qiangnao Technology’s RMB 2 billion (20亿元) financing lineup, there are investment institutions such as IDG Capital and Huaden International, as well as industry giants such as Lens Technology and Lingyi Zhizao. There are also strategic investment institutions such as Runze Technology, Huazhu Group, and TAL Education Group. Among Formata Technology’s investors, there is also backing from industrial capital such as Fourier Intelligence. In JieTi Medical’s RMB 500 million (5亿元) financing, Alibaba leads the round, and Tencent again participates as a follower. The company is also the first target that Alibaba and Tencent have made in the BCI field.

In Lin Zhencheng’s view, as industrial capital and internet tech giants begin to lay out the BCI track, the industry will see more long-cycle capital and supply-chain resources flowing in. This will further promote the development of foundational research at the bottom of the BCI industry, product development, continuous iteration, and deployment of application scenarios.

With industrial capital and internet tech giants entering the market, the bigger focus is business integration and synergy. Multiple interviewees believe that BCI development directions cannot be limited only to applications in the clinical field. In the future, the imagination space for human-machine interaction applications in non-medical fields such as entertainment, education, health, and industrial applications will be broader.

Mao Shuo said that BCI is not only a cutting-edge medical technology, but also an important direction where life sciences and information technology deeply integrate. Taking JieTi Medical as an example, he analyzed that internet tech giants have accumulated deep experience in multi-modal large models, compute-power support, intelligent hardware, and ecosystem layout. They can combine their advantages with JieTi Medical’s strengths in core BCI hardware technologies and clinical conversion, and work together to build a new generation of BCI systems and an even more advanced application ecosystem. “This is both a strong support for medical innovation and a forward-looking layout for next-generation core human-machine interaction capabilities.”

“As the world’s first invasive BCI Class III medical device has been approved for listing, and with internet tech giants entering the BCI field, this can be seen as a landmark—turning point where the industry gradually moves toward commercialization.” Lin Zhencheng said.

Differences in technical routes become evident; institutions’ layouts differ in focus

Although various institutions generally have a favorable view of the BCI track, they place different emphasis on different technical routes and sub-sectors.

Mao Shuo said that Qiming Venture Capital will focus on companies with hard-core technological barriers and clear clinical deployment value. It will重点关注 implantable BCI, neuromodulation, signal decoding and other core areas. It will prioritize companies that have top cross-disciplinary teams, leading clinical progress, and clear technical roadmaps and commercialization paths—especially those founding teams that can transition from scientist to entrepreneur, combining academic strength with industrialization capabilities. It will also pay attention to high-quality targets across upstream and downstream of the industrial chain to complete its investment layout.

In the medium term, Liu Dan is more optimistic about the future development and application of the semi-invasive technical route. “Semi-invasive is like the midfield position on the field. Application scenarios can be entered through medical settings, or through non-medical settings. It allows you to advance with initiative and retreat with defense—relatively flexible.”

Yang Bo has also recently been tracking BCI track projects. He told the reporter that he is interested not only in investment opportunities in top-tier star projects, but also in early-stage technology-driven companies with high growth potential—such as cutting-edge technology projects related to BCI electrodes, signal processing systems, algorithm development, and BCI-plus-embodied intelligence integration.

In his view, for non-invasive BCI projects, there are both medical devices within the rigorous medical system for clinical care and non-invasive BCI products for scenarios such as psychological emotional health, education, and 3C applications. However, the investment-attracting scale of such companies still cannot match the leading top companies in the invasive BCI category.

“BCI’s future development direction cannot be limited only to clinical applications. We hope the policy support system will further extend toward fundamental research, breakthroughs in key core technologies, and multi-scenario integrated applications.” Yang Bo said in an interview with the reporter. “Especially in directions such as the integration of AI and BCI, synergy between BCI and embodied intelligence, and validation of new human-machine interaction scenarios, we hope to see more systematic top-level design,专项支持, and supporting industrial policies.”

While closely monitoring ongoing breakthroughs in invasive BCI technologies, Lin Zhencheng is also highly optimistic about the huge application space and potential of non-invasive BCI. He has already laid out medical projects in areas such as depression, Parkinson’s disease, pain, epilepsy, and Alzheimer’s disease, with applications distributed across in-clinic and at-home scenarios. At the same time, he also sees strong commercial potential for BCI in non-medical fields. Some research teams are already exploring commercialization deployment—for example, brain-controlled drones, brain-controlled cars, brain-controlled games, and so on. “BCI is a track with a long hill and deep snow. We will heavily lay out this track.”

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