Hi everyone,

We are excited to share an opportunity to co-invest in Andromeda Surgical, building "supervised full self-driving" for the operating room. Having backed Nick and his team since Day 1, we are proud to participate in their Series A, led by Standard Capital.

Andromeda is at a major inflection point, perfectly positioned at the intersection of AI and robotics. Key highlights include:

• Clinical Momentum: Over 30 patients have already been successfully treated.

• Commercial Traction: Secured $2M in Letters of Intent (LOIs) from top-tier hospitals.

• Regulatory Runway: FDA clearance is anticipated within 5–6 months, with additional clearances underway in Australia, Brazil, Canada, and Europe.

Andromeda has deep roots in New Zealand: their initial "beachhead" procedure, HoLEP, was pioneered in Tauranga. Leveraging local expertise and New Zealand’s efficient regulatory environment, the team has chosen NZ as their global launch market.

We recently had Nick on our podcast:

Why We're Excited:

We believe this is the perfect time to double down on Andromeda, driven by massive macro tailwinds and immediate commercial and regulatory momentum:

• Massive AI & Robotics Tailwinds: The convergence of advanced AI, machine learning, and robotics has reached a critical inflection point in healthcare. Just as autonomous driving revolutionized transportation, "supervised FSD" for surgery is the next frontier. Andromeda is capitalizing on this wave by bringing the hyper-scalability of a software business to the medical device space. This positions them to capture a massive $3.5T global surgical market (significantly larger than the $2.6T global cars market).

• Commercial Traction & LOIs: The market is ready right now. Andromeda has already signed 9 LOIs representing $2M in first-year revenue from top hospitals and surgeons. This includes a commitment from the prestigious Cleveland Clinic (ranked #3 globally), as well as a top-tier Brazilian hospital that is strategically investing $1.5M directly into the company.

• Imminent Regulatory Clearances: The regulatory path has been significantly de-risked. After 8 FDA meetings, their FDA resubmission is complete. By utilizing long-term data and reworking their indications to lower the bar, they expect FDA clearance in just 5-6 months. Concurrently, their application for the New Zealand launch has already been submitted.

The Team

This is a team of top-tier operators from both healthcare and autonomous vehicles.

• Nick Damiano (Co-founder & CEO): A 3x founder who previously built two successful healthcare companies (including YC-backed ZenFlow) that transformed large markets and reached ~$1B in total value.

• Kartik Tiwari (Co-founder & CTO): A 3x founder who built the first autonomous truck to drive on public roads without a human behind the wheel.

• Engineering & Clinical: The team includes engineers from Cruise and Starsky Robotics. Their clinical partners include the top two global experts in their initial beachhead market.

The Product & Technology

Andromeda's hardware relies on a simple robot with an off-the-shelf arm; the true value and defensibility lie in their software. They are building a foundational model for surgery where every procedure makes the system smarter, safer, and faster.

• Software-First Scalability: Unlike legacy robotics companies that rely heavily on a capital-intensive, per-case disposables model, Andromeda uses off-the-shelf tools. This allows them to focus purely on the intelligence layer, unlocking >95% gross margins at scale and enabling them to move 3-5x faster than incumbents.

• Current Capabilities: The system currently handles 3 of 8 degrees of freedom, featuring a smart pivot point that eliminates force issues, auto-rotate, return-to-home functions, and automatic landmark mapping.

• Traction & Safety: They have already treated 30 patients with 0 unexpected safety issues. In their first cases, surgeons using the system matched typical manual surgery times.

• Scalable Training: They have launched an iPad-based simulator app that makes training as easy as a video game, allowing surgeons to practice both the procedure and the robotic controls remotely.

Beachhead Market

Their perfect first use case is Holmium laser enucleation of the prostate (HoLEP). It is a fast-growing procedure with a large patient population, a huge skill gap between surgeons, and a tech-forward user base. By introducing autonomy, surgeons can potentially double their daily case volume, bringing high-volume hospitals over $100M in additional annual revenue.

Leveraging their strong New Zealand ties and clinical collaboration, Andromeda has already built the world's largest training data set for HoLEP to accelerate their autonomy features.

Unit Economics & Launch Timeline

The company has set world records for speed to clinic and is moving aggressively toward commercialization.

• Unit Economics: They plan to charge roughly $250k upfront plus a $100k annual SaaS fee. By 2029, they expect to generate over $1 million annually from each unit, which carries a target hardware cost of $50k-$60k at volume.

• Launch Timeline: They are launching outside the US in early 2026 (NZ launch pending, plus Canada via ISO MDSAP), followed by a US launch in Q3 2026 pending the imminent FDA clearance.

The Deal

We’re super excited to double down, investing alongside Standard Capital into their Series A at a $60M post-money valuation.

We offer a special deal for our Fund LPs on this high-conviction deal:

• Fund LPs: 10 % Carry / No management fees

• Other syndicate Investors: Standard 20% Carry + one time 2% management fee

• Costs: One-time SPV setup costs will be shared pro-rata across all SPV investors.

Please reply to this email if you'd like to review the deck or discuss the allocation further.