She promises to revolutionize blood tests – but instead Elizabeth Holmes ends up in court: she is said to have deliberately duped investors. Now there is imprisonment.
Former businesswoman Elizabeth Holmes, convicted of fraud, has failed in an attempt to delay the start of her sentence until the appeal process is completed. A California appeals court ruled on Tuesday that there was insufficient doubt about the verdict.
Holmes was the founder and CEO of the start-up Theranos, with which she promised to revolutionize blood tests. With Theranos, only a few drops of blood are said to be sufficient for complex tests. Holmes was celebrated, Theranos reached a valuation of nine billion dollars in financing rounds. But then it turned out that the technology didn’t work. Holmes and her top manager Ramesh Balwani were convicted of allegedly deceiving investors.
Holmes, who had two children during the trial, was originally scheduled to begin her 11-year sentence at the end of April. But with her application to suspend the start of detention for the duration of the appeal, the schedule was overturned. Now a judge in the first instance in San Jose is to set a new date. On Tuesday, he put the amount Holmes and Balwani owed investors at just over $452 million.
Source: Stern
