Mohammed Khambhati Huzefa, a first-year SUTD student, founded Neural Drive — an AI wearable that reads brainwaves and neural biosignals, giving paralysed individuals the ability to communicate and control their surroundings through eye blinks and focused thought.
Singapore, 22 June 2026 – Neural Drive, a startup founded by Singapore University of Technology and Design (SUTD) first-year student Mohammed Khambhati Huzefa, has secured US$250,000 (S$325,000) in pre-seed funding from Afore Capital, a San Francisco-based venture capital firm.
The funding, structured as Simple Agreements for Future Equity (SAFEs) in two tranches at a post-money valuation of US$3.5 million (S$4.5 million), will support Neural Drive's continued product development and growth.
Neural Drive is an AI wearable that reads brainwaves and neural biosignals, enabling paralysed individuals to communicate and control their surroundings through deliberate eye blinks and focused thought. Using a small set of electrodes placed above one eye and behind each ear, the device captures biosignals and self-calibrates in as little as 10 seconds. Users can select on-screen options such as “Food”, “Help” or “I love you”, and control applications like WhatsApp and smart home devices. At approximately S$2,500, it costs a fraction of existing eye-gaze systems, which can range from S$10,000 to S$25,000.
As part of the investment, founder Mohammed, 22, and his co-founder Raymond Ng, 21, will spend one year in San Francisco as part of the Founders in Residence (FIR) programme, working closely with Afore Capital's network to advance Neural Drive’s development. SUTD has granted Mohammed a one-year leave of absence, in line with its commitment to nurturing entrepreneurship among its students.
Mr Nathan Yu, a Principal at Afore Capital, said: “Mohammed and Raymond are exactly the kind of founders we like back at pre-seed: they demonstrate exceptionally high agency, identified a real problem, built a solution from scratch, and iterated relentlessly until it worked for their users. What they have done is impressive — making cutting-edge brain-computer interface technology genuinely accessible to the people who need it most. We are excited to invest in them and support them as they scale through our FIR programme.”
Mohammed said: “This investment is a meaningful milestone, but what drives us has never changed — the patients who are fully conscious but cannot tell their families they are in pain or simply say ‘I love you’. Being at SUTD has given me perspectives and a safe space to explore, and Afore Capital’s support gives us the resources to move faster, build products people want, and establish partnerships that we need to scale. Our long-term goal is to build a scalable AI foundation model for neural and biosignals, and this investment brings us closer to that.”
Professor Chee Yeow Meng, SUTD Provost and Chief Academic and Innovation Officer said: “We are incredibly proud of Mohammed. His curiosity, determination, and commitment to solving real human problems exemplify the spirit of innovation and entrepreneurship that we seek to cultivate at SUTD. Together with his team, he has shown remarkable initiative in taking an idea from observation to invention, and from invention to venture. We are delighted that Afore Capital has recognised the talent and dedication of Mohammed and his co-founders. Securing investment from a Silicon Valley venture capital firm is an important milestone for the team and reflects the remarkable progress they have made in a short period of time. We look forward to seeing how Neural Drive develops in the years ahead.”
He further added: "Mohammed is also an example of the kind of student that SUTD's Design·AI Innovation and Venture Exploration (DIVE) platform is designed to support. Through DIVE, we aim to give more students the opportunities, mentorship and confidence to pursue ambitious ideas and bring them into the world.”
Launched as part of SUTD’s Design AI transformation, DIVE is a $35 million platform that runs alongside academic life to encourage and help create more student founders like Mohammed. Built around learning by doing, it connects students with industry mentors and supports them in developing prototypes, building ventures and testing ideas with real users and industry partners.
Through structured mentorship, early-stage funding such as the Baby Shark Fund, grants, global innovation internships and a residential college, DIVE lowers the barriers for student entrepreneurs and equips them with the resources, connections and confidence to build startups that matter.
The vision behind Neural Drive began during Mohammed’s National Service with the Singapore Civil Defence Force, where he served as an ambulance medic from July 2023 to July 2025 and saw how paralysed stroke patients struggled to communicate. Mohammed spent a year teaching himself neural software through Massachusetts Institute of Technology resources before building his own system from scratch. He met his co-founders — Raymond, Kaushik Manian and Nyan Lin, both 19 — at hackathons. To date, the neural device has gone through more than 380 iterations.
The team’s work has gained recognition on the global startup stage. Neural Drive placed in the Top 40 at TechCrunch Startup Battlefield in San Francisco and won the Asia Pacific category at the Entrepreneurs Next Star & Million Prize Global Challenge in Shenzhen in November 2025, taking home S$150,000. In Ho Chi Minh City this March, Neural Drive won first place at LotusHacks, Vietnam’s largest AI hackathon, co-organised by the HackHarvard community and GenAI Fund. Closer to home, it claimed first place at Nanyang Technological University’s Deep Learning Challenge 2025, beating more than 800 teams, and placed third at the National University of Singapore Health Hack 2025.
Looking ahead, Neural Drive has charted an ambitious growth roadmap. From July, it is preparing for an 18-month clinical trial with Tan Tock Seng Hospital, where 30 patients across inpatient, outpatient and home settings are expected to participate. In parallel, the team is in early discussions with Veterans Affairs Hospitals in the United States on how the technology could support veterans with communication challenges.
The team also plans to expand beyond clinical devices into the consumer electronics space, exploring how its brain-computer interface technology could augment virtual and augmented reality (VR/AR) gaming experiences. It is also developing neural research kits in collaboration with other universities, enabling researchers to capture and compare brain signal data before and after trials to build richer longitudinal datasets.
Neural Drive founders Kaushik Manian, Raymond Ng, Mohammed Khambhati Huzefa and Nyan Lin.
About Neural Drive
Neural Drive Pte. Ltd. is a Singapore-based AI technology startup developing accessible brain-computer interface (BCI) solutions for patients with severe communication impairments, including those affected by stroke and ALS. The company's non-invasive device enables paralysed individuals to communicate through deliberate eye blinks and focused thought, at a fraction of the cost of existing alternatives. Neural Drive is based at the Singapore University of Technology and Design (SUTD) and is preparing for clinical validation in partnership with Tan Tock Seng Hospital (TTSH). For more information, visit www.neuraldrive.tech.
About Afore Capital
Afore Capital is a San Francisco-based venture capital firm specialising in pre-seed investments. The firm backs exceptional founders before product-market fit, providing capital and access to its Founders in Residence (FIR) programme, which brings portfolio teams to San Francisco for hands-on support and its global network. For more information, visit www.afore.vc.
About Singapore University of Technology and Design (SUTD)
The Singapore University of Technology and Design (SUTD) pivoted to AI, becoming the world’s first Design AI university. With Design AI, AI is treated as a collaborative partner rather than just a tool, enabling humans and AI to brainstorm, test and prototype together. This human–AI teaming approach is rooted in SUTD’s distinctive cohort-based interdisciplinary pedagogy, in place since the University’s founding in 2009.
As a trailblazer in the field of design and technology, education and research, SUTD has been pioneering innovative programmes and initiatives since its inception. In January 2026, SUTD broadened the scope of its Design and AI programme by integrating social sciences into a technology degree, recognising the growing need for solutions to be more human-centred. SUTD also revamped its Freshmore curriculum by embedding Design AI across all first-year courses, reinforcing its commitment to reimagining higher education while nurturing the next generation of human-centric design-tech innovators and leaders.
