To create theranos. Doing any lab test from a tiny drop of blood from the finger. From a finger. Oh, my god, this is a rocketship. She was able to put a magic spell on people with her big, blue eyes and deep voice. The whole steve jobs look. The youngest selfmade female billionaire, magazine cover after magazine cover after news article, blog post, speech. The golden girl of Silicon Valley. Part of the new time 100 list. Only problem it didnt work. Did ms. Holmes know theranos could not do all those tests . Yes, she knew. This is a product that didnt work. Not only did they fool the investors all the nanotainers. They fooled patients, doctors. Elizabeth holmes charged with massive fraud. Elizabeth holmes and another former executive await a trial. Holmes pleaded not guilty. I am so incredibly humbled. Enough, Elizabeth Holmes. Listen, this company is a fraud. This is an investigation by the securities and Exchange Commission in the matter of theranos, inc. Elizabeth holmes, grilled by 12 lawyers, investigated for massive fraud. Not how a young billionaire thought her empire would end. Please raise your right hand. Do you swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth . I do. It is certainly not where it began. Elizabeth holmes was born in 1984, at the dawn of tech nation, just one month after the macintosh computer. She was raised in washington, d. C. Her parents, from a young age, thought of their daughter as a special person. The mother worked for various members of congress. The father worked for the state department. Mostly involved in human rights. And she looked up to him as an idealist, which is what she thought of herself as well. She wrote a letter to her father when she was 9. Dear daddy, what i want out of life is to discover something new. Something that mankind didnt know was possible. I also want to study about man and his ways. Life is really interesting. I love being with you. Its my most favorite thing in the whole world. Love, elizabeth. I wanted to do something with my life that people thought was impossible before. At a young age shes asked by a relative, what do you want to do when you grshanswered immedit to be a billionaire. And the relative says, dont you want to be president . And she says no. The president will marry me because ill have a billion dollars. Her family was no stranger to wealth. Elizabeth is the greatgreatgreatgranddaughter of charles fleischmann, and the massive fleischmann yeast fortune. A 42room mansion with 40 servants, polo, yachts, safaris. They helped found the new yorker magazine, and bought Coconut Island off the coast of hawaii. They entertained amelia earhart, and Shirley Temple had a Birthday Party on their estate. But the fortune was no more. This magnificent Family History that they had in terms of this extraordinary wealth had been dissipated by prior generations. So this is a picture of a Young Elizabeth and her brother christian v. Joe fuisz was the familys neighbor when elizabeth was a child. This is my brother, justin, a Young Elizabeth. No evidence as yet of the black turtlenecks. The past of the Holmes Family frequently came up. And its was not hard for me to imagine that the Holmes Family believed that elizabeth was restoring them to their rightful place. The holmes moved to houston, where elizabeth excelled at a private school. Megan long went to st. Johns with her. They both ran track, and she says elizabeth was incredibly driven, and never gave up. Typically when you run a race, the thing that youre going to remember is the person who gets first place. But elizabeth always finished her races last. Everyone would finish the race, and youd hear the announcer say, dont cross the track, theres still a runner on the track. That runner was elizabeth. She was determined to do it. Her High School Yearbook page says dream, laugh, reach for the stars. Years, trying to save th world. Her song, im in a hurry. All i really gotta do is live and die but im in a hurry and dont know why it all paid off when elizabeth went to california for college. She picked stanford which was, like, the obvious choice if you were interested in becoming an entrepreneur and a successful one. In the heart of Silicon Valley, its where many tech giants started. Varian, hewlettpackard, sun, yahoo. Thats why its called Silicon Valley and why it really generated that entrepreneurialism. And of course thats probably why elizabeth came here in the first place. Yes, im sure thats why she came here. Phyllis gardner is a professor of medicine here. She first met elizabeth in 2002. This is wilbur hall. Wilbur hall. Where most stanford freshmen start out. Elizabeth holmes first dorm. First dorm room, right. Elizabeth was brought to me by a person whod been the former president of panasonic, saying to me that she was this brilliant girl and she had this wonderful business idea. She came up with an idea for this blood testing device. And the idea behind the blood testing device was that you would have a sticker on your arm, and this would be constantly checking your blood levels and then if you needed to, youd be able to give yourself an injection of whatever medicine you needed. The skin is a terrible barrier to go across. I kept saying to her, its not feasible. And it just went to deaf ears. How did she respond to the criticism . Just kind of blinked her eyes and nodded, and left, and then came back another time with the same sort of concept. It was just a 19yearold talking whod taken one course in microfluidics, and she thought she was gonna make something of it. Elizabeth didnt want to be told it was impossible because she loved the idea. So she went to another professor. He never allowed freshmen in this advanced course. And she persuaded him that she was capable of doing it, and in fact she was. Elizabeth took Chemical Engineering classes as a freshman. I was very intrigued by her vision. Channing robertson was the chair of the department. Felt it would be a really interesting proposition. And he thought, hey, you know what, i see an opportunity here. Maybe you can do this. Maybe you cant. But lets give it a shot. And he became a kind of a mentor to her and said to me maybe once a century you come across someone like beethoven. Shes a beethoven figure, he said, shes a genius. She is this rare creature. And he bet his career on it. I think he was the first enabler. He dragged her around campus, introduced her to people. And she was breaking down doors herself. This used to be my Advisers Office and i would sit here literally in the hallway waiting for him to come back to his office to try to convince him to let me into his graduate research program. In Silicon Valley, one of the things that people brag about is that they drop out of college. I was at a point where another few classes in Chemical Engineering was not necessary for what i wanted to do. Steve jobs dropped out of college. Mark zuckerberg dropped out of college. Bill gates dropped out of college. Zuckerberg, gates, jobs, holmes. You just have the sense that there are certain people who cannot be held back. Elizabeth dropped out too. She decided she was going to actually try to build it. I think its fair to say that, sure, its a great idea, but its actually scientifically impossible. But that didnt stop her from filing her first patent, the first of many. She had all the ideas, but she didnt have the cash. She didnt actually want to go to some of the traditional investors because she would have to prove that this was something that was even on a remotely, faroff, distant world something that you could do. One person she went to, this guy, tim draper, who was a family friend. He has made billions of dollars from his investments. And he agreed to give her some money to get started. I ended up giving her her first milliondollar check. Everything seemed possible in 2004. But her next idea was much bigger. Something that would use just a drop or two of blood and draw more than a billion dollars in investments. Elizabeth holmes, theranos, a revolution. Wow. And her company began. So did the questions. How quickly was it before you start to notice problems . Say hi. A pandemic has the possibility of bringing us together in ways none of us would have been able to expect. Im so small said the mole. Yes said the boy, but you make a huge difference. boy got it. dad its slippery. boy nooooooo. grandma nooooooo. dad nooooooo. dog yessssss. vo quick, the quicker picker upper bounty picks up messes quicker and is two times more absorbent than the leading ordinary brand. boy hey look, i got it. Bounty, the quicker picker upper. The spread of covid19. To help, were offering free prescription delivery, by simply going to cvs. Com or calling your local cvs. So, stay safe. Because the more we stay apart, the sooner we can all get back together. No. Uh uh, no way. Come on. No. No. N. Ni ni, no no only discover has no annual fee on any card. Reporter Silicon Valley. Built on ambition and innovation. Silicon valley, built on ambition and innovation. Where Everyone Wants to change the world and make a billion dollars while theyre at it. Silicon valley is the largest creation of wealth in a 50squaremile radius than anywhere in human history. The allure of success drew in 19yearold Elizabeth Holmes. She had just dropped out of stanford and had a grand vision to revolutionize health care by making by blood testing more affordable and more accessible for all. She opened her first office in the words therapy and her com diagnosis. But instead of that skin patch idea shed dreamt up in college, she came to envision something else. Weve made it possible to run comprehensive Laboratory Tests from a tiny sample or a few drops of blood that could be taken from the finger. She made it sound so simple. The puncture will be made. The collection tubes will now be held up to the drop. And you will see the blood wick into the channels. The nanotainer tubes are then removed and the sample can be processed immediately. That sample was then put into a cartridge and then placed into this portable device, which she claimed processed hundreds of blood tests, which could detect diseases from stds to even cancer in real time. The ability to be able to use a pinprick and test you right there in a Doctors Office, or even in a battlefield, is revolutionary. It changes everything. I said, this could be the holy grail. She named early prototypes of her invention the edison after another revolutionary thinker. Elizabeth became a master at marketing. Having gone through in my own life, losing people that i loved, i couldnt think of anything that was more meaningful than being able to change what people go through when they say goodbye too soon. From highprofile panels to t. E. D. Talks, that phrase a world in which no one ever has to say goodbye too soon. Became elizabeths mantra. A world in which you dont have to say goodbye too soon. A world in which people dont have to say goodbye too soon. Saying goodbye too soon. She was a good storyteller. Thats part of her seductiveness which is why she was able to raise all this money. By february, 2005, the 21yearold had already raised around 6 million. Behind those piercing eyes was a peculiar young woman who seemed to survive on ambition alone. I had this image of her as kind of like a nunlike existence. You know, black, quiet, all alone. She lived in an apartment, which she wouldnt let me see. She said there was just one bedroom. The refrigerator just had a bottle of water in it. She had a lot of, you know, green drinks, and and all this stuff that i you know, i looked at and i said, oh, my god, i cant. If you are what you eat, what are you . Green juice. Best word to describe you . Mission oriented. Favorite place to visit . My office. One of elizabeths most bizarre characteristics was just her obsession with steve jobs and with Apple Computer and imitating him and the company. She even went after steve jobs own righthand man. Id like to now welcome one of my colleagues, somebody ive worked with for over a decade, dr. Avie tevanian. Avie tevanian had been head of software at apple and was one of jobs closest friends. After retiring, avie learned about Elizabeth Holmes and theranos. When you find these ideas that can cut across everything, its huge. And so clearly if this could be made to work, then it was going to be hugely impactful. Was she selling you on the mission of theranos . How did she come across . She was definitely selling me on a vision for what she wanted to do in this realm of blood testing and making it something that was much more accessible than its ever been. So you joined the board. Joined the board. His involvement attracted others from apple to join theranos like ana arriola, who had helped design the iphone. The opportunity was altruistic, it was potentially humankindchanging and i was very curious. Unfortunately i left 15,000 shares at apple but cest la vie. Ana might have left apple, but to her surprise, she certainly did not leave all of steve jobs behind. Elizabeth was very curious about steves attire, and i explained to her that he was inspired by sonys heritage of having issey miyake come in and create a lot of the line manager apparel. And then i think she went off and tracked down who issey miyake was and the rest is couture history. But ana says elizabeths transformation didnt end there. Her voice what she could figure out a surprising baritone was that it would likely cost her a few thousand dollars to get these tests done. Was fake, according to ana. We didnt know that it wasnt her voice until much later. I think it was at one of the parties, and maybe she had too much to drink or whatnot, but she fell out of character and exposed that that wasnt necessarily her true voice. In this interview with npr from 2005, we hear a very different sounding elizabeth. No, it hasnt. Well, if i use traditional words to describe what were doing, its hard. When she came to me she didnt have a low voice. She didnt . No. What was her voice like when she came to you . Just like a typical undergrad student. When i next saw her again was at the Harvard Medical SchoolBoard Meeting where she was being introduced. She has this low voice, and im like, oh, my god. You know, its this pastiche. Whether it be the turtleneck, the baritone, the swagger, the sense of belief in herself. You were captivated. But then as the money poured in, the problems poured out. Suddenly, it wasnt just her voice that insiders were worried about. I would never expect that anyone would behave the way that she behaved as a ceo. And believe me, i worked for steve jobs. I saw some crazy things. Dr. Jerome adams why should young people care about the spread of coronavirus . Well we know that people with underlying medical conditions over the age of 60 are at highest risk, but theyve got to get it from somebody. Dr. Deborah birx so were asking everyone to be selfless for others so that we can protect those who are most susceptible. Dr. Anthony fauci not going to bars, not going to restaurants, it all just means physical separation, so that you have a space between you and others. Dr. Jerome adams for more information on how you can social distance please go to coronavirus. Gov when the murrays go to work. Michelangelo goes to work, too. 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Coupa cafe, a bustling eatery in downtown palo alto. Just a small black coffee, please. This was the hot spot where the heavy hitters of tech were known to make business happen. And Elizabeth Holmes wanted in on this elite club. Eagleeyed viewers of the social network might even spot Mark Zuckerbergs character with his coupa cafe cup in this scene. Im not a bad guy. Somewhere over there, theres a 40 million check being cut. No, im just kidding. Thats yours, right . By 2006, elizabeths obsession with steve jobs was in full swing. She had already recruited his former righthand man, avie tevadegn a aiolaanw e was ntinu aggressively from apple and Silicon Valleys ranks. I had just gone in there with this expectation that i was meeting brilliance, the next steve jobs, next zuckerberg. Something like that. Shes incredibly passionate. Her passion was pretty intense, pretty compelling. Very expressive with her hands. She has a lot of conviction in her vision. You know, were changing the world. We have the technology to do it. They all eagerly jumped on board. It was the opportunity to join the rocketship. Right . I think i can in retrospect look at intensity in a different light but at the time, yeah, it was great. Almost as soon as they started, they say, life at theranos was just a little bit off. How would you describe the culture at theranos . Justin . Not a lot of camaraderie. A lot of paranoia. The Office Environment was designed to not really interact with anybody else. She believed in multiple levels of secrecy and compartmentalization. Employees say elizabeths style was offputting. For justin, what began as excessive micromanaging turned into actually noticing that this person is willing to lie to me about extremely trivial unimportant things. Silly things like saying she had left the office for the day. And she was actual