Neuralink Brand Strategy

Source: https://neuralink.com/

Key disruptive themes: 1. Direct-to-consumer marketing (pre-purchase) via Elon Musk’s star power and on social media (not common for medical devices) 2. Bypassing doctors via robotics (during purchase phase) 3. Seeding confusion via cyborg talk.

Recommendations: 1. Earn the respect of researchers and doctors, don’t piss them off — you can’t do this alone. Don’t pander to Elon fan boys. 2. Stick with communication around improving health (cyborgs can come later) 3. Don’t overpromise; do overdeliver — this is someone’s life not their sexy car.

Introduction

What is Neuralink and why is it important

• Medical science has made tremendous strides in understanding various parts of the body and curing their respective afflictions. However, it has largely focused on the simpler systems, namely the circulatory system including the heart (i.e the pump and the plumbing), the skeleton (i.e. the chassis) and the muscles (i.e. the horsepower). We have developed many therapies (e.g. cholesterol medication, blood pressure medication) and interventions (e.g. hip implants, stents) in order to treat issues in these systems.
• The brain remains the most important but least understood organ in the body. When it comes to dealing with neurological injury (e.g. paralysis) or mental health issues (e.g. schizophrenia) we remain in the dark ages with crude devices and medications to address critical issues.
• Neuralink is a company that is attempting to create a system that can be implanted in the brain to treat some of these conditions. Unfortunately it is today known more for being an Elon Musk company than an innovative flagbearer for patients.
• The mission of the company is to create a high bandwidth brain machine interface (BMI). This system consists of a device that is implanted in the brain, as well as a robot that implants this device. In the first phase the company hopes to treat neurological issues. In the second phase the company hopes that the interface helps direct human-to-human “telepathic” communication without the need to speak or exchange written text. In the third phase the company hopes to enable humans to have a symbiotic relationship with artificial intelligence (yes you read that right).

Neuralink implant

Elon Musk with the Neuralink Robot

Why is this difficult

• The brain is extremely complicated. The 1.2–1.4 kg organ is only 2% of the body’s weight but controls our bodily functions, our emotions, our thoughts as well as enables us to experience consciousness.
• It does this by using a large number of cells (86–100 billion neurons) but more importantly structuring them as a network. Each neuron is estimated to have up to 1,000 connections to other neurons.
• The computing power of the brain comes from the number of connections as well as the strength of the individual connections. The structure and connections evolve differently for each human as they experience the world, learn skills and create memories (known as neuroplasticity) — the implication is that each person’s brain is different anatomically and functionally — what works for one person will not work for another.
• As we look to address issues in the brain we have to account for this complexity and variance.

Depiction of a neuron network

Where are we today — various methods

(an illustrative list to provide an overview)

• There are multiple methods of “reading” (measuring brain activity) or “writing” (stimulating neurons) but they have severe limitations.
• fMRI — (+) non-invasive (-) low temporal resolution (-) cannot “write” (-) low bandwidth
• EEG — (+) non-invasive (-) low spatial resolution (-) cannot “write” (-) low bandwidth
• DBS — (-) invasive (-) low area of coverage (+) can “write” (-) low bandwidth
• Neuralink (proposed) — (-) invasive (+) high area of coverage (+) can “write” (+) high bandwidth

Clock model

• A medical device is different from a normal consumer product in that there are many stakeholders involved. Stakeholders for a consumer product — producer, regulator, distributor, customer. Stakeholders for a medical device — producer, regulator, distributor, insurer, doctor, patient. The decision makers are typically the doctor and the insurer rather than the patient. Neuralink so far has flipped this, speaking directly to potential patients and users.

Pre-purchase

• Elon Musk presentations — despite his stuttering and filler words Elon Musk is the heir of Steve Jobs’ — he has the ability to create a reality distortion field. His presentations and interviews generate much interest in his companies including Neuralink. His Neuralink presentations are typically for a layperson rather than a doctor which is how most medical marketing works. E.g. he plays up the fact that Neuralink received a breakthrough device classification as if it’s unique while in reality the FDA has approved multiple devices in this category in a hurry.
• YouTube videos published by the company — to https://youtu.be/-gQn-evdsAo
• YouTube videos published by fans (example below) which go into depth and synthesize various sources in Elon Musk’s presentations, various tweets and rumors (free publicity!)

• Twitter — both Elon Musk (47.3M followers) and the Neuralink management are active on Twitter to keep up the excitement around the company. Medical devices take a long time to go from the lab to a widely available product so manufacturers tend to stay away from early marketing because it’s difficult to capture the audience’s attention over a multi-year period. Elon’s star power however makes this possible for Neuralink.

Purchase

• While Neuralink is currently not available for purchase, it is expected to be available via the usual channels but with key differences.
• Doctors and Insurers — Typical — The typical purchase decision in the case of medical devices is made in the following fashion: a patient visits a doctor with a symptom, the doctor analyses the symptom to understand the core problem and recommends solutions, the solution that is covered by the patient’s health insurance program is then chosen. In this workflow the doctor and insurer act as gatekeepers who determine what the patient receives and are thus the targets for marketing investment by medical device companies i.e. “push” marketing.
• Doctors and Insurers — Neuralink— In the case of Neuralink the tremendous pre-purchase publicity will likely result in patients going to their doctors and insurers and asking for the device — a rare example of “pull” marketing in medical devices. This is typically not done in medical devices: 1. If you advertise to the patient, the doctor easily can talk him/her out of the superiority claim saying, “I’ve done many surgeries the old way successfully” and “you have nothing to worry about.” 2. If you succeed in generating patient pull, it will likely come at a much greater patient acquisition cost than alternate ways to convince your points of distribution to use your product. In the case of Neuralink there’s a push to replace the doctor (see the following bullet) which might make the doctor less relevant (making “pull” marketing more effective) and the pre-purchase publicity via Elon Musk makes patient acquisition free in the “pull” model vs. trying to “push” via doctors.
• Surgery at the hospital — the Neuralink device has extremely precise and delicate electrodes (many times smaller than a strand of hair). While this makes the device more effective, it also makes it more fragile and also requires extremely accurate placement. Thus Neuralink also created a robot to ensure successful implantation. While the robot greatly enhances the effectiveness of the device, it is also the company’s trojan horse so that in the future specialist doctors (e.g. neurosurgeons) might not be required for implantation.

Post-purchase

• Tuning: Like other devices (e.g. pacemakers, deep brain stimulation) the Neuralink device is likely to require to be tuned/customized after implantation to be effective. The neuroplasticity of each brain requires a large degree of personalization and hence there will be multiple visits to the hospital and doctor post implant.
• Software upgrades: Tesla is famous for upgrading its cars “over-the-air” and Neuralink will likely be no different. This will be a huge advantage over other companies which are typically stuck with legacy software and hardware (like the car companies that Tesla competes against).

Software is a key differentiator for Tesla

• Replacement: implants eventually fail or need to be upgraded and this will required a skilled surgeon to remove the device from a patient’s skull.

Brand audit

Positives

• Elon Musk — wunderkind, genius, world’s richest man, 47.3mm followers
• Founding team — includes multi-disciplinary experts from semiconductors, biomaterials, cloud computing, brain-machine interfaces
• Potential for incredible impact — the team is focused on launching a product that can help with severe brain injuries (stroke, cancer lesion, congenital problems)
• Innovation (for the layperson)— the precision of the electrodes, the robot, the association with Elon Musk hint at tremendous innovation whereas the traditional companies in the space (e.g. Medtronic, Boston Scientific) are viewed as dinosaurs

Negatives

• Overhyped (according to the experts)— many BMI researchers are annoyed with the claims that Elon Musk has made. Their view is that what Neuralink has achieved so far is the same as other companies or research labs. This is a not a good image for the company since it will need to collaborate with researchers over time to make the device better.

https://www.wired.com/story/neuralink-is-impressive-tech-wrapped-in-musk-hype/

https://www.inverse.com/innovation/neuralink-neuroscientists

• Invasive: Neuralink’s device needs to be implanted and is invasive which means that regardless of how badly healthy early adopters want it, it will face hurdles transitioning beyond severe brain conditions. If the company wants a more mass market device it will need to transition to a non-invasive device but might struggle if it has already pissed off researchers with hype (see previous point).
• Concerns about BMI: Surveys suggest that the public is not comfortable with the idea of having an implant in their brain even if it improves cognitive abilities (see below).

• Cyborg confusion: Elon’s and Neuralink’s public goals of melding humans and computers, and later human intelligence and artificial intelligence, certainly don’t help the concerns the public has about BMI. This detracts significantly from the more immediate mission of the company to help people with severe brain conditions.

Psychology Today

Brand identity model

What it is

• Brand essence — become a cyborg and one with AI (see above)
• Core identity — high bandwidth telepathic communication with other humans

• Extended identity — help with severe brain conditions. Brand as a person: the Borg. Brand as a symbol: Neuralink robot.

Brand as a person: You will be assimilated

What it should be

• Brand essence — should focus on health and regaining capabilities — “feel whole again”, “feel human again”, get back your ability to move
• Core identity — breakthrough innovation and cutting edge technology, democratizing health through low cost and high availability (miniaturization and automation is expected to reduce cost dramatically)
• Extended identity — Brand as a person: paralyzed person who can walk again. Brand as a symbol: Neuralink robot. Brand as an organization: diverse (company video potentially shows transgender engineer — see below), multi-disciplinary.

Brand as an organization: expressive, diverse, multi-disciplinary

Recommendations

Earn the respect of researchers and doctors, don’t piss them off — you can’t do this alone. Don’t pander to Elon fan boys.

• Healthcare has a lot of stakeholders and decision makers, unlike a consumer product
• Researchers — unfortunately they think that Elon Musk talking about “reading” and “writing” to the brain makes their research look less like science and more like science fiction. While Neuralink and Elon Musk might be fine with this (there’s a lot of good science fiction on this topic) serious researchers would have an issue with this and would not want to collaborate with Neuralink — this will slow the company down. E.g. they will need to collaborate when they want to make the move from invasive to non-invasive technology.
• Doctors — like it or not Neuralink will have to depend on doctors for implanting, tuning and replacing the devices (at least initially). Neuralink needs to recognize the tremendous influence doctors hold and not talk about replacing them with robots.
• Consumers — unfortunately the communication seems to focused on the public and these are the folks who are most excited about Neuralink — in the initial phase of the company they don’t matter! Neuralink doesn’t need fan boys. We are at least 10 years away from this being a product for the public (according to Elon Musk). According to science fiction writer Ramez Naam it could be another 50 years.

Stick with communication around improving health (cyborgs can come later)

• Talking about telepathic communication, AI symbiosis is a complete distraction from serious science and delivering care to disabled patients. It reduces the credibility of the company in front of scientists and doctors.
• Neuralink does NOT have to give up its long term goals, it just needs to focus on communicating the shorter term benefits. Paul Graham of YCombinator (world’s pre-eminent startup incubator) says: “You’d expect big startup ideas to be attractive, but actually they tend to repel you…Even the most ambitious people are probably best off approaching them obliquely.”
• Once the initial phase (delivering results to patients with brain conditions) is successful Neuralink can embark on the next phase. If indeed this is the cure against AI taking over the world everyone will be a lot more receptive once Neuralink proves itself by tackling relatively simpler challenges, and when/if the threat of AI becomes more real.
• Potential issues with recommendation: Elon Musk is as concerned about AI as he is about climate change, and he’s using Neuralink as one of the means to deliver the message (he also support OpenAI which is trying to Open Source AI). Reducing communication about the future phases of Neuralink could be viewed as defeating the whole point of funding Neuralink. My view is that communicating a vision that sounds like science fiction reduces the credibility of Neuralink, ultimately preventing it from reaching its goal.

Don’t overpromise; do overdeliver — this is someone’s life not their sexy car

• It’s good to create excitement about how you are trying to help people but it would also be viewed as misleading severely disabled people into thinking their issues can be solved without having much evidence. Telling someone they might have an electric car in 5 years and disappointing them is NOT the same as promising to cure paralysis and not delivering.
• Potential issues with recommendation: One of Elon Musk’s strategies is to keep broadcasting a vision that feels 20–30 years in the future and then to deliver it in 10–20 years, accelerating the future (as he calls it). This requires putting a vision out there as a call to action (and even a threat) to everyone in the ecosystem to mobilize their resources to reach the future faster. Toning down expectations could potentially reduce the speed of innovation. The difference in the case of BMI is that it’s not as established industry like the car industry with multiple large companies who can be pushed to pivot. It’s a small niche industry so there are no incumbents to threaten/push.

Note: recommendations are largely in the pre-purchase and purchase category because the company has not yet launched a commercial version of the device. Post-purchase investment will be extremely important post launch— investing in doctor relationships and managing patient expectations (as recommended) will result in greater likelihood of success post-purchase.