Reprinted from Forbes article with permission:
https://www.forbes.com/sites/annefield/2025/07/30/l3c-helps-maker-of-bionic-hand-serve-those-who-cant-afford-it/
By Anne Field, Contributor
When he was about seven years old Aadeel Akhtar visited Pakistan with his parents, who were born there, and observed something he’d never seen in his hometown of Chicago—a girl around his age missing a limb and using a tree branch to get around.
Aadeel Akhtar with Ability Hand
PYSONIC
That’s when Akhtar, now 38, decided he was going to invent prosthetics that could help people missing limbs. In 2015, he founded San Diego-based Psyonic to achieve that goal, starting with a bionic hand for both humans and robots.
Only there was a problem: While Medicare covered the device, that left out a great many people who could benefit from using it but couldn’t afford the price. So in 2022, he decided to form a Psyonic Institute L3c, a low-profit liability company (L3C) to finance prosthetic hands for those who wouldn’t otherwise have the money to get one. The primary reason: “L3Cs can accept program-related investment (PRIs) from foundations,” says Akhtar.
L3Cs are LLCs whose raison d’etre is to further charitable or educational purposes. In addition, producing a profit isn’t the primary goal and they aren’t aimed at accomplishing political objectives.
Called the Ability Hand, the prosthetic’s secret sauce is its ability to allow the recipient to control the hand, using muscles from the remaining limb, turning them into electronic signals. Users can feel sensation from multiple areas of their bionic fingers when they touch an object. Take Sergeant Garrett Anderson, who lost his hand in Iraq when an improvised explosive device exploded in 2005. “He says he can now hold and feel his daughter’s hand,” says Akhtar. During a demonstration at a Shark Tank presentation last year, he also broke a sizeable plank of wood in half.
Sergeant Garrett Anderson with daughter
PSYONIC
Akhtar originally pursued a medical degree, getting a BA in biology and MAs in computer science and electrical and computer engineering. But while studying to get a MD/PhD in neuroscience, he decided to leave medical school to form a company.
While in school, he also worked with the Range of Motion Project, a nonproft which provides prosthetics to people who couldn’t otherwise afford them. They developed a clunky hand, but the experience made him decide to leave his MD/PhD program and start a business to develop a new kind of prosthetic hand.
Then in 2022, dissatisfied with the device’s lack of affordability for most people, he decided to form an L3C—what would essentially be a philanthropic arm able to accept PRIs from foundations, something that seemed to Akhtar to be a more effective approach than choosing to start a nonprofit.
Akhtar recently formed the Ability Fund, which can accept donations to give someone $25,000 for getting a bionic hand, in partnership with the Range of Motion Project. The L3c is facilitating the fundraising.
In 2020, the company closed on a $1.4 million round from angel investors and venture capital. Last year, they closed on a $4.1 million seed round from more than 2,300 investors through an equity crowd-funding campaign. Akhtar chose that route in part because of the company’s substantial social media presence. According to Akhtar, half of sales come from an active and effective social media campaign.
Last year, he also appeared on an episode of Shark Tank, where three of the judges agreed to invest a total of $1 million for a 6% equity stake.
The company is moving to a 22,000-square-foot manufacturing plant and Akhtar is eyeing an IPO at some point so he can ramp up production. He plans to introduce a new Ability Hand over the next two years, to redesign the device for partial-hand amputees and also to produce a leg prosthetic.