A Singapore-incorporated brain-computer interface startup founded by four undergraduates at the Singapore University of Technology and Design closed a US$250,000 pre-seed round from San Francisco venture firm Afore Capital, per a Singapore University of Technology and Design release distributed by Asia Research News on 23 June 2026. The round was structured as two-tranche SAFEs at a US$3.5 million post-money valuation. CEO Mohammed Khambhati Huzefa, Chief AI Officer Raymond Loong Ng, and co-founders Kaushik Manian and Nyan Lin are the named team. Khambhati and Ng have been admitted to Afore Capital’s Founders in Residence programme in San Francisco for a twelve-month placement.

What Neural Drive’s wearable does

Neural Drive is building a non-invasive electroencephalography and electrooculography (EEG and EOG) wearable for users with severe motor impairment. The device uses surface electrodes positioned above one eye and behind each ear to read brainwave and ocular biosignal patterns. The user-facing function is computer and assistive-device control through eye-blink and focused-thought commands. The release states a ten-second self-calibration on first use, with the target consumer price point at approximately S$2,500 against the S$10,000 to S$25,000 incumbent price for clinical eye-gaze systems.

The device sits in the non-invasive accessibility lane of the BCI category. It does not implant electrodes, does not penetrate the dura, and does not require neurosurgical intervention. This puts Neural Drive commercially adjacent to consumer EEG headset makers (BrainCo, Emotiv, Muse) and to assistive-technology hardware companies (eye-gaze incumbents Tobii Dynavox and Smartbox), rather than to the implantable cohort (Neuralink, Synchron, Paradromics, Neuracle).

The Afore Capital connection

Afore Capital is a San Francisco pre-seed specialist firm running a Founders in Residence (FIR) programme for early-stage technical founders. Afore Principal Nathan Yu is quoted in the SUTD release as having led the Neural Drive investment, with the SAFEs structured to bring Khambhati and Ng into the FIR cohort for a twelve-month residency in San Francisco. The operational centre moves to the United States for the residency window; the entity remains Singapore-incorporated.

US$250,000 at a US$3.5 million post-money valuation is a friends-and-family-adjacent pre-seed in absolute dollar terms. Afore’s brand and FIR distribution function as social capital that scales the round’s signalling weight beyond the headline figure, in a structure familiar to US founders but new to the Singapore BCI cohort.

Prior to the Afore round, Neural Drive received a Singapore Million Prize award of S$150,000 in November 2025 after reaching the TechCrunch Startup Battlefield Top 40. The S$150,000 prize is a separate funding event from the US$250,000 Afore pre-seed.

The clinical pathway

The release names a planned eighteen-month clinical trial at Tan Tock Seng Hospital in Singapore, beginning in July 2026, enrolling thirty patients with severe motor impairment. The trial is the company’s first scheduled regulatory-quality data generation. Tan Tock Seng Hospital is a major Singapore tertiary care centre with an active rehabilitation medicine programme.

A regulated hospital trial is required to substantiate the eye-blink-and-focused-thought control claims under conditions that meet medical-device data standards. The Tan Tock Seng cohort positions Neural Drive for downstream HSA (Singapore Health Sciences Authority) registration or international regulatory routes if pursued.

Where this sits in the Asia-Pacific BCI map

Inside BCI’s Asia-Pacific synthesis piece, published 21 June 2026, named Thailand as the only verifiable Southeast Asia BCI move during 2026, through the private-sector CP Group activity (Axoft Series A lead and True Corp x OYMotion partnership in late April). At time of that piece, Singapore had not surfaced a 2026 BCI-specific funding or industrial-policy event despite the Economic Development Board’s broader AI and biomedical sector activity.

Singapore now sits on the Southeast Asia BCI map as a second jurisdiction after Thailand, with a structurally different vehicle. Thailand surfaced through a private conglomerate (CP Group) routing capital into a Boston-headquartered electrode-platform startup (Axoft) and a Shanghai partnership (OYMotion). Singapore has surfaced through a Singapore-incorporated student startup receiving Silicon Valley pre-seed capital and a Singapore hospital clinical trial. The Industrial Builder posture frame, anchored on China and South Korea, does not capture either move. Both are private-capital pathways operating outside state-cluster vehicles.

Two structurally different commercial vehicles in two months opens a measurable cadence question for Southeast Asia BCI activity. The cadence is small in absolute dollar terms but consistent in direction across two jurisdictions.

What to watch

The first signal is whether Neural Drive’s Tan Tock Seng Hospital trial enrols its thirty-patient cohort on schedule. A July 2026 trial start with an eighteen-month protocol places the primary readout in early 2028. Mid-trial interim signals on the eye-blink-and-thought control accuracy and false-positive rates will be the first non-marketing performance data on the device.

The second signal is whether Khambhati and Ng’s twelve-month Afore Founders in Residence cohort produces a follow-on round. The Afore FIR graduate pattern typically routes companies into a US$3 to US$8 million seed twelve to eighteen months after entry, raised from US institutional pre-seed and seed firms. A 2027 seed round at meaningful size would position Neural Drive as the first verifiable Singapore BCI startup to clear the institutional capital threshold.

The third signal is whether Singapore’s Economic Development Board or ASTAR responds to the Neural Drive moment with a category-specific industrial programme. Singapore’s existing biomedical sector funding is research-grant-heavy and applied through ASTAR institutes and the Bioprocessing Technology Institute. A dedicated BCI or non-invasive neural sensing programme would convert today’s bottom-up startup signal into a top-down industrial-policy signal, matching the cadence China and South Korea have now produced through their respective Industrial Builder vehicles.

The Neural Drive round is small in dollar terms. The strategic placement of an SUTD student team into an Afore FIR cohort in San Francisco, with a Singapore hospital trial on a regulatory clock, is the kind of dated commercial milestone that scales into a category over multiple rounds. Whether Neural Drive specifically scales or not, the move opens Singapore as a verifiable Southeast Asia BCI jurisdiction on Inside BCI’s coverage map.

Sources

• SUTD student startup Neural Drive secures US$250,000 from Afore Capital (SUTD release via Asia Research News, 23 June 2026)
• Afore Capital website
• Afore Capital Founders in Residence programme
• Singapore University of Technology and Design (SUTD)
• Tan Tock Seng Hospital
• Inside BCI — Asia-Pacific synthesis (21 June 2026)
• Inside BCI — Thailand SE-Asia BCI hub (10 May 2026)