Welcome to the inaugural issue of Dynamic Neurotech’s AxonPitch series. Each month, we’ll highlight 2-3 promising early stage startups in neurotechnology or adjacent industries. If you’re a founder, apply here for the chance to be featured in the future.

AxonPitch

Theta Neurotech

Stage: Pre-Seed

Categories: Neurotech, EEG

Founders: Truman Pierson, Christopher Fitz

Pitch (Founder Submitted):

• Theta Neurotech is developing 24/7-wearable EEG patches that alert patients with epilepsy of their impending seizures (up to 2 hours before onset).

• The team is in the clinical stage and achieved 87% seizure prediction sensitivity in its first study with data from Boston Children's Hospital (results to be published in the coming months).

• Our EEG patch is made soft and skin-like through a novel electronics manufacturing process, allowing the device to be worn continuously.

• Our first 1,500 patients have joined our waitlist in 12 weeks.

• Clinicians from UChicago, UVA, UCSF, and Harvard are supporting Theta's clinical and scientific validation on the path to market.

My Input: I am a fan of Theta Neurotech’s minimalist form factor and should their technology prove to be accurate and consistent, I think the small patch will generate a lot of interest from patients/consumers.

Lifestack by DeMind

Stage: Pre-Seed

Founders: Nao Yukawa, Hayato Waki, Toma Itagaki

Categories: Wearables, Productivity

Pitch (Founder Submitted):

• Building Lifestack -- the first productivity tool that uses wearable health data to help people schedule their day smarter based on their biology.

• Team has deep expertise in AI and neuroscience—CEO studied at Japan's top AI research lab, and previously built and exited Japan's largest neurotech media outlet together. Our advisor is a former VP of Sales at Oura.

• We're post-revenue, and starting to get recognized by top productivity influencers. Last month, we ranked as the #1 health & fitness product of the month on Product Hunt.

• Selected for TechCrunch Startup Battlefield and Berkeley SkyDeck IPP (won 1st place @ demo day 👑).

• We envision Lifestack as a platform that brings together data from your calendar, weather, GPS, computer usage, food intake, wearables, and more — becoming the foundation for a true Human OS.

My Input: As someone who does a ton of tracking with wearables, this sounds like an efficient way to make that data more actionable.  When considering the potential of this product, lots of interesting features come to mind.  Luckily this team has an earned reputation for listening to their users and shipping fast.

Check out our podcast episode with Nao (Lifestack’s CEO and founder)

Other Startups That Caught My Eye

• Subsense is developing a “non-surgical, nanoparticle-based bidirectional brain-computer interface” and has raised $17M in seed funding to do so.

• Alljoined aims to be “an API for thoughts.” This company decodes EEG data utilizing deep learning. Per Ashlee Vance, Alljoined believes AI can make up for the deficiencies of EEG technology.  They appear to be initially focused on images, but plan to eventually expand to emotion, intent, and train of thought.

Dynamic Neurotech Podcast

We’ve released numerous episodes since our last newsletter. Check them out at our YouTube or wherever you get your podcasts.

Some of our most popular episodes include: 

• Piramidal’s Kris Pahjua: YC Startup Building a Foundation Model for the Brain

• Bionic Vision Technologies’ Dr. Ash Attia: Returning Vision to the Blind

• Eywa Neuro Founder and Ex-Neuralink-er Kaustubh Deshpande

• Studying Psychedelics, Sex, and more w/ fMRI Imaging: Neuroscientist Dr. Matthew Wall

• Dr. Paul Le Floch, CEO Axoft

Further Reading/Listening

• Avoiding Black Mirror’s Dystopia While Investing in Tomorrow’s Neurotech (SPOILERS)

• Neurotech Futures

• Max Hodak Loves Brains