Mosaic Intelligence Labs raises $47 million for surgical AI

By Nathan Brooks

Mosaic Intelligence Labs emerged from stealth with $47 million in seed funding, according to the company. The round was backed by 8VC, Fundomo, Lingotto Innovation, Obvious Ventures and other investors. Mosaic said the capital will develop sensing-enabled surgical instruments and AI-powered spatial intelligence for navigating the vascular system.

Mosaic initially focuses on endovascular interventions, in which physicians guide flexible wires and catheters through blood vessels to reach treatment locations inside the body. These approaches access organs and tissues without the large incisions required for conventional open surgery, the company said.

Mosaic says navigating complex vascular paths remains technically demanding. Physicians typically combine real-time X-ray imaging, preoperative scans and physical feedback from instruments to determine their position, and difficult anatomy often demands extensive training and experience.

What does this change for physicians?

Mosaic’s proposed system would give instruments a more comprehensive understanding of their surroundings. It would reconstruct vascular anatomy and provide a continuously updated three-dimensional view of instrument location and surrounding structures, the company said. A robotic interface would pair that information with precise instrument control.

The practical change is the integration of sensing, spatial understanding and movement, according to Mosaic. The platform would synchronize data on anatomy, instrument positioning and physician actions. Computational models would use that record to learn from surgical experience over time, with the aim of preserving insights from complex procedures and adapting as conditions change.

Existing surgical instruments generally do not maintain an evolving understanding of the anatomy they encounter, Mosaic said. Physicians still interpret imaging and physical feedback and continually adjust their movements. Mosaic wants its platform to close that gap.

The technology remains under development, and Mosaic’s announcement does not establish regulatory authorization for clinical use. The company said the approach could eventually support physicians performing technically demanding procedures.

Mosaic’s design draws on embodied artificial intelligence, in which intelligent systems interact with and learn from physical environments. In robotics, a world model represents aspects of an environment and helps a machine anticipate the potential effects of its actions, the company said. Mosaic applies related principles to instruments operating inside the human body.

The company also draws on umwelt, a biological concept describing how an organism perceives its surroundings through its sensory capabilities. Mosaic believes surgical machines need comparable sensing and feedback before they can develop more advanced intelligence. Linking what an instrument senses, how it moves and the effects of those movements forms the basis for the company’s vision of adaptive systems.

Mosaic was founded by Dr. Ileana Pirozzi, who serves as CEO, and Dr. Alison “Ali” Kight Mackanic, who serves as CTO. The founders met during their doctoral studies at Stanford University. Their research and observations in operating rooms showed them how heavily navigation depends on clinical expertise, and they began exploring how technology could capture and extend that knowledge.

Dr. Pirozzi, co-founder and CEO, said:

“We spent years in operating rooms watching extraordinary people do extraordinary things. But what really stayed with us was just how much depended on knowledge that lived in the hands and minds of the person holding the instrument.

We kept returning to one question: what would it take to scale the knowledge of the very best surgeons? We believe that starts with making our machines aware, and turning surgical repetition into experience we can learn from.”

Dr. Alison “Ali” Kight Mackanic, co-founder and CTO, framed the missing feedback loop this way:

“There is no evolving loop between perception and action, and as a result they are structurally locked out of the ability to become intelligent.”

Mosaic chose the vascular system as its starting point because blood vessels provide access to organs and tissues throughout the body. The company said catheter-based interventions can deliver drugs, energy, biological therapies and other treatments directly to specific locations. Better navigation could expand the range of procedures performed through those pathways and increase consistency across operations, according to Mosaic.

The longer-term goal is to make advanced surgical capabilities more accessible through intelligent machines that accumulate knowledge through repeated clinical activity. That ambition depends on the near-term work: advancing Mosaic’s sensing, robotics and computational infrastructure with the seed financing. The technology must still translate into an authorized clinical system; the announcement did not establish regulatory authorization.

Mosaic is expanding its San Francisco team and recruiting in hardware engineering, sensing, perception, machine learning and clinical engineering. The company said its existing team includes people who worked on surgical systems used to treat more than 20 million patients. Their backgrounds also include artificial hearts, aerospace systems and other complex engineering applications.

The $47 million buys Mosaic development time, but not regulatory authorization. For physicians, the proposed benefit is better navigation and control; for Mosaic, the next test is turning its learning system into a clinically authorized tool.