Surgeon-Built AI Startup Raises $8.4M to Transform Operating Rooms

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XRlabs, a London-based surgical AI startup founded by a neurosurgeon, has raised $8.4M in seed funding to bring real-time, anatomy-aware AI into operating rooms. The platform has been used in over 100 surgeries across three continents.

XRlabs, a London-based company developing AI for surgery, has raised $8.4 million in seed funding. The round was led by Playground Global, a DeepTech venture firm in Palo Alto, with participation from London-based HealthTech investor Eka Ventures. The company also announced that Omar Ishrak, former CEO and Chairman of Medtronic and former chairman of Intel's board, has joined as Chair of its Board of Directors. Founded in 2024 by practicing neurosurgeon Dr. Ali Haddad, XRlabs is headquartered at the London Institute for Healthcare Engineering, with a second office in Palo Alto. The company builds modular, device-agnostic software that acts as an external AI layer on top of the surgical systems hospitals already use. ### What XRlabs Does XRlabs' platform uses computer vision and deep learning to combine live video from surgical scopes, navigation data, and pre-operative CT and MRI scans into a single, real-time, anatomy-aware view during surgery. The platform has been used in over 100 surgical cases across three continents. The company offers two main products: - **XRlabs SIM:** A patient-specific planning and rehearsal tool that turns standard CT and MRI scans into interactive 3D models or digital twins. - **SurgicalOS:** An intraoperative intelligence layer that brings the digital twin into the live surgical view. Together, they form what XRlabs calls the "Pyramid of Surgical Intelligence," a layered approach that mirrors how surgeons are trained—starting with anatomy and building toward real-time operative skill. > "Our conviction is that the operating room is the next frontier for physical AI. Surgery generates extraordinary data, yet almost none of it becomes intelligence in the moments that matter most. This financing lets us change that at scale, moving Surgical Intelligence from landmark first cases to foundational infrastructure in every operating room," said Dr. Haddad, founder and CEO. The funding follows several clinical milestones, including the first-in-human use of physical AI in cranial neurosurgery (integrated with an ORBEYE 4K 3D exoscope) and a world-first in AI-designed patient-specific implants used in the successful separation of craniopagus twins. ### What's Next for XRlabs XRlabs plans to use the seed funding to expand its engineering and clinical teams, navigate regulatory pathways in the UK, Europe, and the US, and grow its clinical evidence base at partner institutions worldwide. The company has also received a compute allocation on the UK AI Research Resource (AIRR), the UK's national AI compute infrastructure, to support the development and scaling of its AI capabilities. "The best physical AI companies come from people who've experienced a problem in their field firsthand and have the deep expertise to know how to fix it," said Bruce Leak, General Partner at Playground Global. With this funding, XRlabs aims to make surgical intelligence a standard part of operating rooms globally.

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