Elizabeth Holmes, najmlajša milijarderka, ki je svoje premoženje ustvarila sama (Forbes), je v hudih težavah. Ameriški nadzorni organi bodo po vsej verjetnosti prepovedali obratovanje njenim revolucionarnim laboratorijem Theranos, ki znajo razmeroma poceni, zgolj s pomočjo majhne kapljice krvi, opraviti mnoge zahtevne krvne teste. Težave z njeno napredno tehnologijo so menda tako hude, da naj bi ji za vsaj dve leti prepovedali voditi ali imeti v lasti kakršen koli laboratorij za pregledovanje krvi. (Regulators Propose Banning Theranos Founder Elizabeth Holmes for at Least Two Years – WSJ, kopija odločbe inšpektorja: cms20160412.pdf)
Tule je kratka predstavitev njene poslovne ideje:
in še povzetek tega, kar je znanega o težavah s tehnologijo za izvajanje krvnih testov, ki naj bi jo razvila:
Theranos’s current set of problems started with an October Wall Street Journal published investigation. In it, Carreyrou showed that the company’s claims of a health care revolution were overblown. Contrary to Holmes’s public statements, Theranos had allegedly been collecting blood samples using the traditional way and then diluting them so they could be run on machines made by other companies — not their much-hyped Edison technology. …
More recently, however, critics had begun asking for proof that Theranos’s technology actually works, and that its results are accurate. After all, the evidence on this wasn’t public: The Food and Drug Administration hadn’t cleared Theranos’s tests. And Holmes had never published her claims in peer-reviewed journals. …
Then in October 2015 came the massive Wall Street Journal investigation. Carreyrou eventually discovered and reported that it appears Theranos rarely even used its much-hyped Edison technology in its tests. Instead, the startup allegedly relies mostly on older technology by companies like Siemens for the bulk of its testing. (This was in contrast to the company’s claims that it used older machines only for “certain esoteric and less commonly ordered tests.”)
What’s more, there are real concerns that the company’s signature Edison machines — the ones that have garnered all the hype — aren’t nearly as accurate as claimed. On this point, Carreyrou cited former employees, internal emails, and doctors. One Theranos employee even complained to regulators that Theranos had been gaming the system, “failing to report test results that raised questions about the precision of the Edison system.” …
So how did Theranos get so much hype with such weak claims?
There’s no shortage of Silicon Valley companies that claim to be changing the world, but Theranos stood out for a couple of reasons: It had an amazing origin story, it was led by a young woman in a mostly male tech industry, and it promised to solve a problem that was relevant to most people. …
(Vir: Theranos was supposed to revolutionize blood tests. Now its CEO faces an industry ban. – Vox)
