StairMed claimed it can implant its brain-computer interface in about ten minutes, threading the device through a vein in the neck rather than opening the skull. Co-founder Zhao Zhengtuo described the transvascular approach at the Global Health Summit in Hong Kong, positioning it against Neuralink's open-skull surgery. Unlike Synchron's Stentrode, which sits inside a blood vessel, StairMed's device is designed to exit the vessel and anchor just outside its wall. The technique has so far been tested only in sheep, with human trials yet to begin.