Scamming Theranos for investors

A jury in San Jose, on Monday convicted Elizabeth Anne Holmes, businesswoman, founder and CEO of biotechnology company Theranos, of defrauding investors, according to CNN.

The jury acquitted Elizabeth Anne Holmes of 7 other charges of defrauding investors and patients. The charges on which she was convicted, however, could result in a maximum 20-year prison sentence and $250,000 in damages for 4 counts each. By the way, the dates will be set later.

In 2003, Holmes at the time a 19-year-old Stanford University student founded the biotech company Theranos. A year earlier, she had received a scholarship for a research project. She dropped out after convincing her chemical engineering professor, Channing Robertson, to use the money to develop an innovative blood analysis system. Holmes' idea was to create a device that could perform dozens of tests and diagnose hundreds of diseases from a single drop of blood taken from her finger.

The idea proved attractive to investors. Theranos grew rapidly in capitalisation, the company became one of Silicon Valley's leading companies, and Holmes was compared to Steve Jobs, Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg. In 2015, however, it emerged that Edison's microquantitative analyzer was not working. Holmes was sued for fraud and defrauding investors. The company quickly depreciated and ceased to exist.