Recently, the website of the State Intellectual Property Office updated a new invention patent, named "Method for controlling stimulator, stimulator, brain-computer interface system and chip", and the inventor of the patent is Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd.

It is reported that this is Huawei's second brain-computer interface related patent. As early as June 2023, Huawei announced a patent called "A brain-computer interface device and information acquisition method". Brain-computer interface is one of the most popular phenomenal technologies in recent years, and its potential in the medical field is highly expected by the industry. According to McKinsey's calculations, the potential market size of global brain-computer interface medical applications is expected to reach US$40 billion in 2030, and it is expected to exceed the US$145 billion mark by 2040.

With the increase in R&D investment, the medical application of brain-computer interface has gradually shifted from early abstract concepts to landing results. In September, Elon Musk's brain-computer interface company Neuralink announced that its Blindsight has been certified as a breakthrough medical device by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Musk said on social media that this experimental device, called "Blindsight", will enable people who have lost both eyes and optic nerves to see things. If the visual cortex is intact, it can even allow people who are born blind to see things for the first time.

Based on the phenomenal clinical breakthrough capabilities and commercial transformation potential, brain-computer interfaces have been sought after by the capital market in recent years. Currently, companies such as Neuralink, Synchron, and Blackrock Neurotech in the United States occupy the top seats in the industry, and related projects in China are also in a period of rapid development. According to the "Research Report on the Development and Application of Brain-Computer Interface Technology (2023)" of the China Academy of Information and Communications Technology, as of the first quarter of 2023, there are more than 500 representative brain-computer interface companies in the world, distributed in more than 40 countries, of which the number of American and Chinese companies exceeds 100, ranking first in the world in terms of quantity.

The domestic brain-computer interface industry is in full swing, policy support is also being promoted, and standardized standards are gradually being clarified. On January 18, the Chinese government website issued the "Implementation Opinions of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology and Seven Other Departments on Promoting the Innovation and Development of Future Industries", which clearly stated that high-end medical equipment integrating advanced technologies such as digital twin brain-computer interaction should be developed. On October 8, the State Food and Drug Administration issued a notice on the establishment of two medical device industry standards: "Terms and Definitions of Medical Devices Using Brain-Computer Interface Technology" and "Test Methods for the Perception and Response Performance of Implantable Neurostimulators with Closed-Loop Functions for Medical Devices Using Brain-Computer Interface Technology" were approved. With official support and the establishment of industry norms, the commercial development of domestic brain-computer interfaces will be more stable.

Just looking at the news that Huawei has obtained a patent for a brain-computer interface, it cannot be directly determined that it will enter the relevant medical field, but Huawei does pay close attention to the health industry and has been deeply deployed for many years. As early as 2021, Huawei's electrocardiogram analysis prompt software had obtained a medical device product registration certificate, and currently has launched a number of wearable medical devices for heart rate monitoring. From the perspective of product attributes, brain-computer interfaces are highly correlated with wearable devices. Recently, Synchron, a leading brain-computer interface company, announced that it has successfully connected its brain-computer interface system to Apple's Vision Pro head-mounted display device. The company is currently trying to integrate ChatGPT into its brain-computer system.

According to a report by market research firm Canalys, Huawei showed strong growth momentum in the global wearable device market in the first quarter of 2024, ranking first in the global growth rate with a growth rate of up to 46%.

According to the current provisions of the domestic "Medical Device Classification Catalog", brain-computer interface-related equipment is mainly divided into Class II and Class III, as follows: Due to the late start and safety considerations, non-invasive brain-computer interfaces with low thresholds are the mainstream technical route in the domestic market at this stage. Therefore, manufacturers with wearable device technology reserves have a natural advantage. Huawei's technical accumulation in brain-computer interfaces at this time can help it invest in related layouts at any time in the future. CITIC Securities said that invasive brain-computer interfaces are at the critical point of large-scale clinical trials, and non-invasive brain-computer interfaces are also actively embracing the "singularity" of industrialization. In the future, every step of progress in the commercialization of brain-computer interfaces will attract great attention from the global market and increase the investment boom in the domestic track. With the entry of domestic technology giants such as Huawei, the market competition for domestic brain-computer interfaces will be upgraded again, and the opponents of medical device companies may no longer be limited to "peers".

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