Sources have exclusively revealed to Reuters that Elon Musk’s brain implant company, Neuralink, is now worth around $5 billion.
The startup was valued at around $2 billion in a private fundraising round two years ago. This latest valuation news is based on “privately executed stock trades described to Reuters by five sources with knowledge of the matter,” the news agency reports. It adds, however, that it doesn’t know whether the seller actually found buyers at this new stock price.
It comes after Neuralink's announcement on 25th May that US regulators have given approval for a human trial of its brain chip. Musk has grand plans for the company stating his belief in December that the technology would be ready for implant in a human brain in the next six months. He told journalists at the time: “As miraculous as that may sound, we are confident that it is possible to restore full-body functionality to someone who has a severed spinal cord…”.
However, experts told Reuters that they believed it may take at least a decade before Neuralink is able to commercialise its implant. As well as accusations of hype, the company has also faced scrutiny over its use of animals for experimentation as well as a probe “as to whether Neuralink illegally transported dangerous pathogens on chips removed from monkey brains without proper containment measures”, says Reuters.
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