Andromeda Surgical raises $15 million to push autonomy into prostate surgery

Why it matters

Andromeda is testing whether a focused, software-first robot can introduce autonomy to surgery without the hardware budgets and long timelines associated with incumbent systems.

Nick Damiano and Kartik Tiwari, co-founders of Andromeda Surgical, announced in an August 3rd post that the surgical robotics developer raised a $15 million Series A led by Standard Capital. Y Combinator and VOX Capital also participated.

Andromeda says the round brings its total funding to $30 million. The valuation and full investor list were not included in the announcement.

The South San Francisco company is building a software-first robotic platform for minimally invasive surgery, beginning with holmium laser enucleation of the prostate, or HoLEP. The procedure removes tissue that obstructs urine flow in patients with benign prostatic hyperplasia.

Andromeda's current clinical program is robot-assisted. Its Beacon platform allows a urologist to control surgical instruments through software during transurethral endoscopic procedures. Andromeda says it is developing AI models that could eventually perform surgeon-supervised autonomous tasks, using clinical data to guide decisions and improve the platform over time.

That distinction matters in a field where autonomy can describe anything from navigation assistance to a machine executing parts of an operation. Andromeda's website states that Beacon is not commercially available and has no regulatory approval in the US or any other country.

A narrow route into the operating room

Damiano and Tiwari chose HoLEP because the procedure creates a defined entry point for the broader platform they want to build. Andromeda says its spatial navigation system provides GPS-like anatomical guidance, while a tablet interface lets surgeons control the single-arm robot without the training programs required by larger surgical systems.

The company reported its first robotic-assisted HoLEP procedure on December 19th, 2024, at Universidad Catolica in Santiago, Chile. That case opened Andromeda's ASTRA clinical study.

The trial's federal registry describes a 54-patient, single-arm study measuring whether surgeons can complete robotic-assisted HoLEP without converting to a conventional procedure. It also tracks adverse events, operative time, hospital stays and complications. The study is recruiting at three locations in Chile and New Zealand, with completion estimated for December 30th, 2026.

The clinical plan gives Andromeda a contained environment for developing autonomy. Surgery occurs inside mapped anatomy, with a surgeon supervising each move and standardized instruments performing repeatable tasks. The operating room also imposes a higher safety and regulatory threshold than the roads where Tiwari first worked on autonomous machines.

Founders cross medtech with autonomous vehicles

Damiano previously co-founded Zenflow, which developed a minimally invasive treatment for the same prostate condition Andromeda is targeting. He started Zenflow with Shreya Mehta during Stanford's 2013-14 Biodesign Innovation Fellowship. Damiano also co-founded the surgical telepresence company Avail Medsystems, whose technology Mendaera acquired in March 2024.

Tiwari previously co-founded Starsky Robotics, where he led work on autonomous trucks. The two founders met through Y Combinator's co-founder matching program and formed Andromeda in 2023 around the thesis that software and autonomy techniques developed for vehicles could be adapted to surgery.

The pairing gives Andromeda experience on both sides of its core risk. Damiano has taken urology products through clinical development, while Tiwari has built software for machines operating in safety-critical physical environments. Their challenge is turning those backgrounds into repeatable clinical evidence and regulatory clearance.

Standard Capital's participation also fits Andromeda's software-heavy pitch. The firm, run by Dalton Caldwell, Paul Buchheit and Bryan Berg, describes itself as an "AI-native Series A firm." Its published model targets at least 10% ownership, avoids board seats and focuses on companies it considers ready to scale an existing product rather than search for one.

Andromeda has already moved Beacon into live procedures, but its registered study remains in progress and the system cannot yet be sold. The Series A finances the difficult stretch between a working surgical robot and a regulated product, where clinical results will determine how much of the founders' autonomy thesis can move from software roadmap to operating room.