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Inside Elizabeth Holmes's Chilling Final Months at Theranos (vanityfair.com)
In the final months of Theranos, before the blood testing start-up was debunked and its founders charged with fraud, then-CEO Elizabeth Holmes brought a puppy, who she insisted was a wolf to others, with a penchant for peeing into the mix, according to Vanity Fair, which has detailed the chaos that ensued in the waning days of the startup, once valued at $9 billion. The 35-year-old Stanford University dropout has also met with filmmakers who she hopes would make a documentary about her "real story," the outlet reported. She also "desperately wants to write a book." An excerpt from the story: Holmes brushed it off when the scientists protested that the dog hair could contaminate samples. But there was another problem with Balto (name of the dog), too. He wasn't potty-trained. Accustomed to the undomesticated life, Balto frequently urinated and defecated at will throughout Theranos headquarters. While Holmes held board meetings, Balto could be found in the corner of the room relieving himself while a frenzied assistant was left to clean up the mess. [...]
By late 2017, however, Holmes had begun to slightly rein in the spending. She agreed to give up her private-jet travel (not a good look) and instead downgraded to first class on commercial airlines. But given that she was flying all over the world trying to obtain more funding for Theranos, she was spending tens of thousands of dollars a month on travel. Theranos was also still paying for her mansion in Los Altos, and her team of personal assistants and drivers, who would become regular dog walkers for Balto. But there were few places she had wasted so much money as the design and monthly cost of the company's main headquarters, which employees simply referred to as "1701," for its street address along Page Mill Road in Palo Alto. 1701, according to two former executives, cost $1 million a month to rent. Holmes had also spent $100,000 on a single conference table. Elsewhere in the building, Holmes had asked for another circular conference room that the former employees said "looked like the war room from Dr. Strangelove," replete with curved glass windows, and screens that would come out of the ceiling so everyone in the room could see a presentation without having to turn their heads.
By late 2017, however, Holmes had begun to slightly rein in the spending. She agreed to give up her private-jet travel (not a good look) and instead downgraded to first class on commercial airlines. But given that she was flying all over the world trying to obtain more funding for Theranos, she was spending tens of thousands of dollars a month on travel. Theranos was also still paying for her mansion in Los Altos, and her team of personal assistants and drivers, who would become regular dog walkers for Balto. But there were few places she had wasted so much money as the design and monthly cost of the company's main headquarters, which employees simply referred to as "1701," for its street address along Page Mill Road in Palo Alto. 1701, according to two former executives, cost $1 million a month to rent. Holmes had also spent $100,000 on a single conference table. Elsewhere in the building, Holmes had asked for another circular conference room that the former employees said "looked like the war room from Dr. Strangelove," replete with curved glass windows, and screens that would come out of the ceiling so everyone in the room could see a presentation without having to turn their heads.
next you're going to tell me that sharks with frickin laser beams on their fricken heads is a bad investment.
Personally I'd rather have my idiots at home glued to the TV than out doing idiotic things
What a coincidence! Wil Wheaton's house number in The Big Bang Theory was 1701.
Due diligence and best practices were sacrificed at the alter of political correctness. People were so desperate to have a female CEO and founder of a large company that they disregarded established safeguards. People need to learn that best practices and due diligence are there for good reasons.
I'm not objecting to having woman starting and running a business (my wife has done this - I think it's a good thing). I'm objecting to people disregarding established standards in the name of political correctness. Let this be a lesson that narrative should never trump best practices.
I stopped reading the article the moment they called her a WASP. As soon as they break out the racist terms, I know they are not going to unbiased.
Why is it ok to call a white person from an upper middle class background a WASP, but it's not ok to call a black person the nword or a person of jewish descent a Jew. Seriously WTF does her race or upbringing have to do with any of this?
She is an instrument of fraud. And she risked people's lives with piss poor testing.
Corporatism != Free Market
One thing I've learnt with some college dropouts is that they quit because they generally take shortcuts for most things in life. My ex team-lead was the same thing, crazy shortcuts/hacks he would do in his code because he couldn't be bothered to take the time to finish it properly.
That's V Pee!
I'll see your senator, and I'll raise you two judges.
The other stuff is the normal corporate stupidity of giving executives too many privileges. But this is fraud. It could be her mansion, and she was paying for it from her personal funds. Or it could be Theranos' mansion, and she was paying the company rent to live in it. But having the company pay for "her" house is fraud (it's not a legitimate business expense, so she's essentially stealing money from the shareholders), and probably tax evasion (company gets to write it off as a tax-free expense, she doesn't have to pay income taxes on the benefit received).
> Misogynistic male pigs can't stand to see women succeed, so they make up lies about them.
No need to lie when the truth is so bad.
I'll see your senator, and I'll raise you two judges.
That is not entirely correct. Some of Silicon Valley culture is made up of bovine digestive product, and some smaller percentages are from other species. The exact formulation is a closely held secret. Kept in a bank in Atlanta GA next to the coke formula.
I'll see your senator, and I'll raise you two judges.
It definitely does some things 10x better/faster than existing systems (I guess I should have lead with that), but for a well established market like RDBMS where products like Postgres or SQL Server have been around for decades; I thought 2x in the general case was a pretty high bar to clear.
I forgot who but she's somebody's God daughter or something. As long as we continue to pretend our ruling class doesn't exist they're untouchable. Warren Buffet nailed it. (apologies for the WaPo link, open it in incognito/private mode).
Her father was a VP at Enron(!) then worked at government agencies and her mother was a Congressional staffer. Explains why almost all of her board members were former government officials (none of the board members had experience with biomedical technology-how that didn't raise red flags with investors I don't know; they were probably too busy seeing green)
The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for it to be pitted against a slightly greater evil
Can you imagine a fund in your 401K funding this frivolity, this literal SHIT SHOW - and yes I wrote shit because she would bring in her non-toilet trained dog and allow it to shit in the board room.Private jets. Insane spending on rent, office....I don't care who you are and how rich you could make my investors be, there have to be limits. This is beyond what is acceptable.Insanity.
If you're quite finished with your rant, Theranos was never publicly traded so no 401K fund would have bought it.