Elizabeth Holmes education, a dropout from Stanford University’s chemical engineering program, became one of the wealthiest individuals in Silicon Valley.
Holmes’ company, Theranos, holds a staggering valuation of US$9 billion, claiming to have revolutionized disease diagnostics.
About Elizabeth Holmes
Elizabeth Holmes was an American biotechnology entrepreneur.
She founded Theranos, a company that developed a blood testing technology that used only a few drops of blood.
In 2003, Theranos was established and managed to secure more than $900 million in investments, reaching a peak valuation of $9 billion.
However, in 2015, the truth emerged that Theranos’ technology did not possess the accuracy it had previously asserted.
As a consequence, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission initiated an investigation into the company, leading to charges of fraud against its founder, Holmes.
Elizabeth Holmes Education
Holmes attended St. John’s School in Houston, Texas, and graduated in 2002.
She was interested in computer programming and says she started her first business selling C++ compilers to Chinese universities.
Her parents had arranged Mandarin Chinese home tutoring, and partway through high school, Holmes began attending Stanford University’s summer Mandarin program.
In 2002, Holmes attended Stanford, where she studied chemical engineering and worked as a student researcher and laboratory assistant in the School of Engineering.
Career
Holmes Worked In Singapore
After the end of her freshman year, Holmes worked in a laboratory at the Genome Institute of Singapore and tested for severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus (SARS-CoV-1) through the collection of blood samples with syringes.
She filed her first patent application on a wearable drug-delivery patch in 2003.
Holmes reported being raped at Stanford in 2003.
Elizabeth Holmes Education and Dropping Out of Stanford
In March 2004, she dropped out of Stanford’s School of Engineering and used her tuition money as seed funding for a consumer healthcare technology company.
Holmes founded Theranos in 2003 with the goal of developing a new method of blood testing that would use only a few drops of blood.
Theranos raised over $900 million from investors, including Rupert Murdoch and Larry Ellison.
At its peak, investors valued the company at $9 billion.
The Fall of Elizabeth Holmes
In 2015, The Wall Street Journal published a series of articles scrutinizing Theranos’s technology, claiming that the company’s blood testing machines were inaccurate and unreliable.
This led to an investigation by the FDA and the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of California.
In 2018, the authorities charged Holmes with fraud and conspiracy to commit fraud.
In January 2022, authorities found her guilty of four counts of fraud and conspiracy to commit fraud.
Consequently, Holmes received a 12-year prison sentence and a court order to pay $10,000 in restitution.
Summary
Elizabeth Holmes, an American biotechnology entrepreneur, founded Theranos with the goal of revolutionizing disease diagnostics using minimal blood samples.
After leaving Stanford University’s chemical engineering program, she established Theranos, which gained a valuation of $9 billion and attracted substantial investments.
In 2015, it became apparent that Theranos’ technology did not provide the accuracy it had claimed.
Securities and Exchange Commission launched an investigation, resulting in fraud charges against Holmes.
In 2022, authorities convicted her of fraud and conspiracy to commit fraud. She received a 12-year prison sentence and a restitution order.