Elon Musk estimated on Wednesday that in six months his neurotechnology startup Neuralink will be able to implant its first connected device into the human brain to communicate with computers directly through thought, AFP reported.

“Of course, we want to be very careful and make sure that it works well, but we have submitted all our documents to the FDA (health agency in the United States) and we think that within six months we will be able to get our first implant in – a person,” said the head of Tesla, SpaceX and other startups during the presentation of Neuralink’s progress.

“We are now confident that the Neuralink device is ready for humans, so the timing also depends on the FDA approval process,” he later wrote on Twitter, the social network he acquired a month ago.

The billionaire is used to making risky predictions, especially regarding the autonomy of Tesla electric cars.

Musk made other predictions

In July 2019, he suggested that Neuralink could conduct its first human trials in 2020.

But so far, coin-sized prototypes have been implanted in animal skulls.

Thus, several monkeys can “play” video games or “type” words on the screen simply by following the movement of the cursor on the screen with their eyes.

Neuralink progress and what the chip can be used for

On Wednesday, engineers Elon Musk and Neuralink summarized the startup’s latest advances in developing robotic surgeons and developing other implants to be inserted into the spinal cord or eyes to restore mobility or vision.

In addition to the potential to treat neurological diseases, Elon Musk’s ultimate goal is to ensure that humans are not intellectually overwhelmed by artificial intelligence systems.

Other companies are working on controlling computers with thought, such as Synchron, which announced in July that it had implanted the first brain-machine interface in the United States.

In recent months, Elon Musk has urged his employees to work faster. “We’re all going to die before anything useful happens,” he told the Neuralink team during the meeting, according to Bloomberg.

He recently fired more than half of Twitter’s employees, as well as Twitter executives who publicly opposed him, and asked the remaining employees to take on “extremely intensive work.”

The annual Neuralink conference is organized to attract various specialists.