Neurotech Wearable 'Temple' Raises $54M
Neurotech startup Temple has raised $54 million at a $190 million valuation to build a high-performance wearable. The device aims to track cerebral blood flow for elite athletes, signaling strong investor interest in next-generation biometric hardware.
Temple is the new venture from Zomato co-founder Deepinder Goyal, who recently stepped down as CEO of Zomato's parent company. Goyal personally invested about $12.5 million (₹104 crore) in this seed round and has previously committed $25 million of his own funds to a personal research initiative called Continue Research. The $54 million "friends-and-family" funding round was led by Peak XV Partners, Steadview Capital, and Info Edge Ventures. The round also included participation from over 80 angel investors and founders, such as Vijay Shekhar Sharma of Paytm and Kunal Shah of CRED. In a sign of internal confidence, more than 30 Temple employees also invested their own money at the full $190 million valuation. The Temple device is a small sensor worn on the temple designed to non-invasively monitor cerebral blood flow (CBF) in real-time. This focus on brain-focused biometrics aims to differentiate it from wearables like the Apple Watch, WHOOP, and Oura, which primarily track metrics like heart rate and sleep. The company is hiring specialists in computational neuroscience and brain-computer interfaces. The core idea stems from Goyal's "Gravity Aging Hypothesis," which theorizes that gravity's long-term effects may reduce blood flow to the brain and contribute to neurological aging. While the startup has faced some skepticism from the medical community regarding the device's clinical validity, the goal is to provide a data layer that currently doesn't exist for tracking cognitive resilience and brain health. Initially, the wearable is being positioned as a high-performance tool for elite athletes to monitor cognitive load and physiological readiness. Research has shown that tracking cerebral blood flow can be valuable in assessing concussions and recovery in athletes. To align the team with its target user, Temple has instituted a unique and controversial hiring mandate requiring that male employees have under 16% body fat and women under 26%. New hires who don't meet the criteria are given a three-month probationary period to reach the target.
