Merge Labs has emerged from stealth with $252 million in funding from OpenAI and others. It aims to use ultrasound to read from and write to the brain. On Thursday, OpenAI announced its investment in neurotech startup Merge Labs, cofounded by its CEO, billionaire Sam Altman . OpenAI will collaborate with the new venture to develop technology to link people's brains to computers. Merge Labs has raised $252 million in funding from OpenAI, private investment firm Bain Capital, video game developer Gabe Newell, and others to use ultrasound to read and modulate the brain.

Merge Labs, a brain-computer interface startup that seeks to read brain activity using ultrasound, is being spun out of Forest Neurotech, a Los Angeles nonprofit. Samuel Altman, CEO of OpenAI, testifies in Washington, DC, on May 16, 2023. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman's new brain-computer interface startup, Merge Labs, is being spun out of the Los Angeles-based nonprofit Forest Neurotech, according to a source with direct knowledge of the plans. It will focus on using ultrasound to read brain activity. Along with Altman, WIRED has learned, Forest Neurotech's CEO Sumner Norman and chief scientific officer Tyson Aflalo are among the cofounders of Merge Labs, which is still in stealth mode.