Product: NeuroOmega Brain Recording and Stimulation Tools Developer: Imad Younis Company: Alpha Omega Year of Foundation: 1993
If Israeli innovation is characterized by the ability to overcome challenges, Imad Younis surely exemplifies success in the face of adversity. Born and raised in Nazareth, Imad Younis obtained a BS degree in electrical engineering from the Technion but most of the high-tech industry in Israel in the 1980s was dominated by the military and, as an Israeli Arab, he had only limited employment options. Imad was determined however to achieve more than just personal goals and in 1993 founded Alpha Omega Engineering with the aim of bringing hi-tech to the Arab community.
Alpha Omega began as an R&D subcontractor company working with companies and scientists in the neuroscience research field but Younis gradually strengthened the core-competence of the company in the fields of neural recording and stimulation, identifying a need to improve the accuracy of Deep Brain Stimulation implantations. Alpha Omega developed electrodebearing devices capable of safely navigating within the brain, recording neural activity, stimulating neural tissue, and processing and analyzing recorded data. In a manner that is similar to the functioning of a GPS, the system, named NeuroOmega, guides a neurosurgeon to the required location where a permanent electrode is implanted to eliminate symptoms of neurological and psychiatric disorders such as Parkinson’s and dystonia, thereby allowing a patient to return to normal life. The unit is completely portable for easy maneuverability. Its compact size, affordable price, and ease of use, make it ideal for community hospitals and low volume centers and it has received approval in the United States, the EU and China.
Alpha Omega is today considered a worldwide leader of technology in the fields of neuroscience and functional neurosurgery with an extensive and established customer base worldwide, and products that can be found in the most advanced hospitals, universities, and research institutions across the globe. No less important, the company has fulfilled Imad Younis’s vision and has led the way to the integration of thousands of Israel’s Arab minority into the high-tech sector.
Alpha Omega employs more than 80 people, including Christians, Muslims, and Jews, at headquarters in Nazareth and branches in Germany, the United States, and most recently in China. The company’s products been installed and used today at more than 500 hospitals and laboratories around the world, participating at thousands of brain surgeries every year.
