When 19-year-old Elizabeth Holmes set out to revolutionise the billion-dollar blood testing industry, the outcome was supposed to be nothing short of groundbreaking. Except it wasn’t. Like many others, Holmes’ overzealous ambition was spurred by the promise of fame and fortune, which eventually saw the demise of her $1 billion company.
Holmes deceived global business executives into believing that the innovative technology she created was actually legitimate; however, as it turned out, it was all one big lie.
But was she a con artist or simply a determined young woman with noble intent? It’s the question that’s spawned multiple documentaries, including HBO’s The Inventor: Out for Blood in Silicon Valley, Amanda Seyfried-led film The Dropout, as well as a podcast by the same name and now Nathan Fielder’s You Can See Everything, which made a surprise premiere at Telluride Film Festival.
Who Is Elizabeth Holmes?
Prior to 2015, you’d be forgiven for not having heard of Elizabeth Holmes. While the failed entrepreneur managed to fly under the radar, for the most part, it’s easy to have missed where she came from or what exactly has landed her in hot water.
Holmes was just 19 when she withdrew from Stanford University, where she studied electrical and chemical engineering, to focus on the launch of Theranos. The name was an amalgamation of ‘therapy’ and ‘diagnosis’, its purpose was to revolutionise the way blood testing was performed.
In order to acquire funds, Holmes turned to several family connections to secure $8.4 million by the end of 2004.
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What Did Elizabeth Holmes Do?
Under the leadership of Holmes, Theranos marketed groundbreaking technology that could perform hundreds of lab tests using minimal amounts of blood.
Instead of collecting blood samples through traditional needles, samples could be obtained from a finger stick and deposited into a small tube called a “nanotainer.”
By the end of 2015, Holmes had raised approximately a whopping $129 million for her now-defunct company. As the funds continued to roll in at a frightening pace, she was subject to widespread media attention and was exalted as a financial visionary and feminist pioneer. In 2015, she was even crowned Forbes‘ youngest self-made female billionaire in America for her efforts.
Yet, Holmes’ deception eventually caught up with her when John Carreyrou, an investigative journalist from The Wall Street Journal, received a tip from a Missouri-based pathologist who questioned the veracity of Theranos‘ technology. Carreyrou spent two years investigating the alleged misdeeds of Theranos, which eventually culminated in a series of explosive reports exposing the company for its illegitimate methodologies.
In 2016, it all came crashing down when Holmes was removed from the lab-testing industry for two years and by 2017, the company had officially closed its last laboratory.
Then, in 2018, Holmes and the former president of Theranos, Ramesh Balwani, were indicted for their fraudulent conduct. After surrendering control of the company, Holmes was fined $500,000 and subsequently banned from serving as an officer or director of a public company for 10 years.
Three years later, Holmes was prosecuted and convicted of fraud after prosecutors argued that she knowingly misled investors and patients about the capabilities of Theranos’ technology. In 2022, she was sentenced to 11 years and three months in prison for her crimes.
RELATED: Where Is Elizabeth Holmes Now?
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