ONWARD Medical gets exclusive rights to Clinatec’s WIMAGINE BCI technology

ONWARD Medical N.V., the medical technology company creating spinal cord stimulation therapies to restore movement, function, and independence in people with spinal cord injury (SCI), has signed an exclusive license with CEA to develop and commercialize the investigational WIMAGINE brain-computer interface (BCI) designed by Clinatec as part of its investigational ARC-BCI System to restore thought-driven movement and function of the human body.

“Securing exclusive rights to the WIMAGINE BCI gives us an opportunity to be first to market with a BCI-enabled system to restore thought-driven movement after paralysis,” says ONWARD Medical CEO Dave Marver. “Clinatec is a world-renowned biomedical research institute and its BCI is ideal for our applications. We can now develop a truly integrated system that is well suited for the type of study required to gain regulatory approval and bring a BCI-enabled system to market,”

The ONWARD ARC-BCI System combines the WIMAGINE BCI from CEA with investigational ONWARD ARC-IM Therapy (targeted implanted spinal cord stimulation) to form a DigitalBridge designed to enable thought-driven movement after paralysis. The WIMAGINE BCI has 7 years of human safety data and ONWARD ARC-IM Therapy has now been applied in more than 30 study participants.

In May 2023, researchers reported in Nature that when paired with ARC-IM Therapy, an implanted BCI allowed an individual to gain augmented control over when and how he moved his paralyzed legs. In September 2023, the company announced a second individual was implanted with ARC-IM Therapy and a WIMAGINE BCI to restore upper limb function after paralysis. And in September 2024, a third individual was implanted with an ARC-BCI System to restore thought-driven movement of her legs after SCI. Additional implants are planned in the coming months.

The company has been working with CEA teams at Clinatec and .NeuroRestore to advance these studies, which are supported by grants from the Christopher & Dana Reeve Foundation and the European Innovation Council.

“The early clinical feasibility research demonstrates the remarkable potential of the ARC-BCI System to restore thought-driven movement and function after paralysis,” says Guillaume Charvet, head of the Neurotechnology Biomedical Research Unit at CEA. “We are pleased to partner with ONWARD Medical and look forward to seeing this technology further developed and made accessible for the benefit of those with spinal cord injury.”

To learn more about ONWARD Medical’s commitment to partnering with the SCI Community to develop innovative solutions for restoring movement, function, and independence after spinal cord injury, please visit https://www.onwd.com/.

*All ONWARD® Medical devices and therapies, including but not limited to ARC-IM®, ARC-EX®, ARC-BCI™, and ARC Therapy™, alone or in combination with a brain-computer interface (BCI), are investigational and not available for commercial use.