NeuCyber Neurotech, the Chinese state-backed brain-computer interface company affiliated with the Chinese Institute for Brain Research in Beijing, has publicly acknowledged a roughly three-year technology gap with Neuralink. Rotating CEO Li Yuan told Reuters the lag comes down to clinical experience: “About three years’ lag because they have over 20 patients using it already.” Neuralink reported 21 enrolled participants as of January.

NeuCyber’s most advanced device, Beinao-2, is a fully invasive BCI with flexible electrodes that penetrate brain tissue. It remains in large-scale animal testing. Li estimated that translating it into a registered medical product will require another two years of animal work and early feasibility trials before full human studies can begin, followed by the regulatory registration process itself.

Beinao-1 fills the gap

While Beinao-2 works through preclinical stages, NeuCyber has been implanting its semi-invasive Beinao-1 in patients since early 2025. Beinao-1 uses a high-density electrode array placed on the brain’s surface rather than penetrating cortical tissue. The approach trades signal depth for a lighter surgical procedure and a simpler regulatory path.

Seven patients have received the device so far. The patient cohort includes a paraplegic survivor of spinal cord injury, a hemiplegic stroke survivor, and an ALS patient with speech impairment. After six months, participants demonstrated improved hand motor function and could remotely control computer cursors and robotic arms. In the ALS case, the system was able to decode and output Chinese speech — a significant milestone for a non-alphabetic language where character-level decoding is substantially more complex than in English-language BCI studies.

NeuCyber plans to expand the Beinao-1 trial to 50 patients this year. If it hits that target, the study would exceed any single active US trial in participant count. The expansion is backed by 200 million yuan (roughly $29 million) in funding from the Beijing municipal government.

Ownership and structure

NeuCyber’s institutional position is unusual by Western standards. The company is owned by the Zhongguancun Development Corporation, a state-owned enterprise that generated more than 9 billion yuan ($1.24 billion) in revenue in 2023. CIBR, the institute that incubated NeuCyber, was established in 2018 as part of Beijing’s broader push into brain science and neurotechnology. Li told Reuters that CIBR and NeuCyber were actively in talks with additional investors and seeking to raise further funds.

The structure gives NeuCyber manufacturing infrastructure and sustained government backing that most Western BCI startups — which depend on venture capital rounds and are vulnerable to funding gaps between milestones — do not have. It also means NeuCyber’s timeline is less sensitive to market conditions and more aligned with China’s five-year plan, which elevated brain-computer interfaces to a core strategic industry.

Pricing and market access in China

Separately, Hubei province has published China’s first formal pricing guidelines for BCI procedures: 6,552 yuan (roughly $900) for an invasive implant procedure, 3,139 yuan for device removal, and 966 yuan for non-invasive BCI fitting. These figures are far below what comparable procedures would cost in the United States and suggest that Chinese regulators are already planning for volume deployment, not just research-stage pricing.

Zhongguancun Forum and what comes next

CIBR plans to unveil Beinao-2 at next week’s Zhongguancun Forum in Beijing, running March 25 to 29. CIBR director Luo Minmin has used the lead-up to call for collaboration between China, the United States, and Europe on BCI development — a notable stance given the competitive framing that dominates coverage of the sector.

Li’s candour about the Neuralink gap is worth noting in a field where competitive positioning tends toward optimism. The three-year estimate also suggests NeuCyber sees Neuralink’s robotic implantation system and electrode density — capabilities that required years of development and hundreds of millions in private funding — as the benchmark to clear, not just match.