Neuranics Raises £1.9M Pre-Seed to Build the Magnetic Sensing Platform for Wearable Health and Human-Machine Interfaces
March 31, 2025
Neuranics, a spinout jointly developed from research at the University of Glasgow and the University of Edinburgh, has raised £1.9 million in a pre-seed funding round led by Par Equity, with participation from GU Holdings (the University of Glasgow's investment company), Old College Capital (the University of Edinburgh's venture investment fund), and London-based Creator Fund. The investment will be used to advance the company's magnetic sensing technology towards commercial applications in health monitoring devices, fitness wearables, and human-machine interface systems.
Neuranics was founded by CEO Noel McKenna and is built on breakthrough research in spintronics — a field at the intersection of semiconductor physics and magnetism that exploits the spin of electrons, rather than just their charge, to detect and process information. The company's core innovation is a chip-scale magnetic sensor that can detect extremely weak magnetic signals emanating from the body, such as those produced by the electrical activity of the heart, skeletal muscles, and neural tissue, using scalable semiconductor fabrication at room temperature. This is a significant technical departure from existing approaches to magnetic biosensing, which typically rely on superconducting quantum interference devices (SQUIDs) — instruments that require cryogenic cooling to operate, cost hundreds of thousands of pounds, and must be housed in shielded rooms. Neuranics' sensors are small, low-cost, low-power, and operable in ambient conditions.
The medical measurement opportunity this creates is substantial. Magnetocardiography (MCG) — measuring the magnetic field produced by the heart's electrical activity — provides complementary and in some cases superior information to conventional electrocardiography (ECG) for diagnosing cardiac conditions. Magnetomyography (MMG) — measuring the magnetic activity of muscles — has significant potential for gesture-controlled prosthetics and advanced human-machine interfaces. Magnetoencephalography (MEG) — capturing brain magnetic signals — is currently limited to fixed laboratory installations. Neuranics' technology could, in principle, enable all of these measurements in a form factor suitable for integration into consumer wearables or clinical devices that patients can use at home or carry with them.
At the time of its pre-seed raise, the company was already in active conversations with several tier-one consumer electronics groups who saw the sensor technology as a potential basis for next-generation health and fitness wearables, as well as for advanced gesture controllers that could form part of the metaverse interaction stack. Par Equity partner Robert Higginson noted that it was rare to find a technology that was both genuinely transformational and backed by a well-rounded team capable of executing the commercialisation journey.
Neuranics' ambition is to become the world's leading magnetic sensor company, selling sensor chips and licensing its technology into hundreds of millions of devices annually across health, fitness, and human-machine interface applications.
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