MintNeuro raises €4.4M for implantable neural chips targeting Parkinson's and epilepsy

MintNeuro (London) has raised €4.4 million (~$5M) in a financing round led by Odyssey Ventures, with 33East, JSK Investments, Alumni Ventures, Empirical Ventures, and Jumpspace Ventures participating. Founded in 2022 as an Imperial College London spinout by Dorian Haci (CEO), MintNeuro develops miniaturised, wireless implantable chips for neural recording and stimulation in Parkinson's disease and epilepsy. The stage is unstated.

The implantable neural interface gap

Deep brain stimulation (DBS) for Parkinson's disease has been clinically available since the 1990s. It works: continuous high-frequency stimulation of specific brain nuclei dramatically reduces tremor, rigidity, and bradykinesia for many patients. It also has well-understood limitations: the implanted pulse generator is the size of a pacemaker, the leads are wired, and the stimulation protocol is fixed — adjusted manually by a clinician at scheduled visits based on patient-reported symptoms, not real-time neural data.

The gap MintNeuro targets is the recording layer. A DBS device that can record neural activity in real time, and adjust its stimulation parameters based on what it hears, delivers closed-loop therapy — a fundamentally different treatment paradigm than the current fixed-schedule approach. Closed-loop DBS has been demonstrated in research settings with Parkinson's patients; the engineering challenge is delivering it in a chip small and power-efficient enough for practical long-term implantation.

Imperial College and the miniaturisation bet

MintNeuro's founding in 2022 as an Imperial College spinout connects it to one of Europe's strongest neurotechnology and bioelectronics research programmes. The chip architecture — miniaturised, wireless, high-recording-resolution — addresses the specific constraints of long-term neural implants: battery life, device size, infection risk, and recording quality over years.

"Neural interfaces for chronic conditions like Parkinson's and epilepsy need to be miniaturised, wireless and long-lasting. That's what MintNeuro has engineered," said Haci.

First-in-human as the milestone

The €4.4M funds two concurrent tracks: advancing the preclinical programme (demonstration of performance metrics in animal models) and initiating the regulatory and engineering work that leads to a first-in-human trial. That milestone — the point at which the chip's design must withstand scrutiny from a human safety data package — is both the critical de-risking event for investors and the gate before which no commercial activity can occur.

Alumni Ventures' participation is notable: the US-based network fund gives MintNeuro access to the transatlantic academic and investor network that Imperial College spinouts often need to navigate, particularly for clinical partnerships and US regulatory strategy.