Carreyrou writes a lot about how Holmes idolized Steve Jobs and his unwillingness to compromise on his vision. Health technology requires a different approach than other kinds of technology, because human lives are on the line. If they had, they might have noticed the red flags a lot sooner. The Theranos board had some heavy hitters-including several former Cabinet secretaries and senators-but for most of the company’s existence, none of them had any expertise in diagnostics.

To start, a company needs relevant experts on its board of directors. There’s a lot Silicon Valley can learn from the Theranos mess.

Her investors got their blood tested by the same machines available in any lab in the country, and they had no idea. When results didn’t come back right away, Holmes sent the investors home and promised to follow up with results.Īs soon as they left, an employee would remove the blood sample from the device and transfer it to a commercial blood analyzer. The device had been programmed to show a really slow progress bar instead of an error message. Holmes would invite prospective investors to the lab, so they could get their blood tested on a Theranos machine. Some of the details he shares are-for lack of a better word-insane. Because he was so integral to the company’s demise, Bad Blood offers a remarkable inside look. The public didn’t know about Theranos’ deception until Carreyrou broke the story as a reporter at the Wall Street Journal. She and her former business partner are now facing potential jail time on fraud charges, and Theranos officially shut down in August. But Holmes was so good at selling her vision that she wasn’t stopped until after real patients were using the company’s “tests” to make decisions about their health. The problem? Their technology never worked. She gave massively popular TED talks and appeared on the covers of Forbes and Fortune.īy 2013, Theranos was valued at nearly $10 billion and even partnered with Walgreens to put their blood tests in stores around the country. Elizabeth Holmes founded it when she was just 19 years old, and both she and Theranos quickly became the darlings of Silicon Valley. If you aren’t familiar with the Theranos story, here’s the short version: the company promised to quickly give you a complete picture of your health using only a small amount of blood. Still, I recently found myself reading a book so compelling that I couldn’t turn away.īad Blood: Secrets and Lies in a Silicon Valley Startup by John Carreyrou details the rise and fall of Theranos. I often find myself unable to put a book down-but they’re not the kinds of books that would keep most people glued to their chairs.

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