Theranos Whistleblower Shook the Company and His Family
wsj.com
wsj.com
It says in the article he graduated with a degree in Biology, but point taken.
FYI: "As household staff served them dinner in the formal dining room, the elder Mr. Shultz said Ms. Holmes had told him Theranos’s blood-testing devices worked so well that they were being used in medevac helicopters and hospital operating rooms, Tyler Shultz recalls. He and his colleague knew that wasn’t true."
From the article:
"Using an alias, Tyler Shultz contacted New York state’s public-health lab ..."
"... Mr. Shultz began speaking to a Journal reporter as a confidential source."
"... regulatory complaint Mr. Shultz had filed under the alias Colin Ramirez"
The decision to confront the CEO personally was his own, he could've chosen the anonymous path all along.
Schultz Jr was contacted in LinkedIn by a WSJ reporter, he did not hide his identity because he likely (empirically) realized that his anonymous complaint would be ignored.
He didn't have to hide his identity from a WSJ reporter because journalistic sources are protected by similar set of laws. To the readers of WSJ he was just a "confidential source".
Then the article says: "In March 2015, Tyler Shultz was contacted by a Journal reporter through the professional network LinkedIn."
Something doesn't match up here. I can only assume that his anonymous complaint did not reach the desired effect in a year, and he went via other channels, using his own renouned last name.
It would also seem rational for the investigative reporter to ping 20-30 LinkedIn contacts who listed Theranos as their employer in hopes that 2-3 would reply, so maybe he wasn't the only one the reporter contacted.
Was Tyler the only confidential source to talk to the WSJ? Probably not. because of that whole two sources rule good journalists follow.
It's worth pointing out that Shultz seemed to have acted in good faith initially, and apparently didn't think anonymity was justified:
> Mr. Shultz says he took his concerns directly to Ms. Holmes. When they met in early 2014, she encouraged him to talk to Daniel Young, a Theranos vice president in charge of biostatistics.
He seemed to have acted with optimistic intentions for Theranos. It was only later that he sent a more scathing email, after which he waited for a few days, got the arrogant reply from the Theranos president, and then quit.
Given all of the professional and personal reasons he had to hope the best for Theranos, he had plenty of excuses to just let things go with a it's-above-my-paygrade mentality. Because it was, on paper, above his paygrade, and his boss and coworkers have the prestigious degrees and engineering experience to argue that Tyler is just mistaken.
It's not easy in a cult-like company to call out shit even as/after the shit hits the fan. But it seems rarer to be the frog that jumps out of the warm water, when all the other frogs feel fine and are also threatening to sue the fuck out of you if you do jump.
If I'm reading the article correctly, the lawyers who harassed him were hired by the company and not by his grandfather. The only lawyers his family hired were the ones fighting for him.
> His grandfather asked if he would sign a one-page confidentiality agreement to give Theranos peace of mind. According to Tyler Shultz, when he said yes, his grandfather revealed that two lawyers were waiting upstairs with the agreement...Tyler Shultz says his grandfather protested to the lawyers that this wasn’t what he and Ms. Holmes had agreed to earlier, but that Mr. Brille kept pressing the younger Mr. Shultz to admit he had spoken to the Journal.
Still, the grandfather was working in concert with Ms. Holmes, and I imagine at the time, it would've been difficult for Tyler to give his grandfather the benefit of the doubt, assuming that Tyler was not expecting lawyers to jump out at his grandfather's command.
I actually missed the paragraph where it's mentioned that his parents "pleaded with him to agree to whatever Theranos wanted" and told him that they might sell their house to deal with the legal costs. Add that to the checklist of things I'm not sure I could do if I were in his shoes.
(That his parents only responded to the WSJ reporter via a prepared statement suggests that there's still tension.)
I'd love to believe that being honest and ethical will one day provide some kind of reward, but the reality is that it doesn't - in fact in this world you are indeed punished for it - so you just have to accept that being good is its own reward.
It's something I really struggle with - the fact that the more dishonest you are, the more willing you are to lie, cheat, steal, kill, mislead, destroy, hurt, insult, and all the rest, the more successful you will be. I've seen it over and over in business - retail magnates practically eat children for breakfast. I remember "do you employ any n-ggers" lady, who runs a major UK fashion label, and "I know we said we'd pay but what the fuck are you going to do about it, my brother's the local magistrate" with particular fondness. The worst part about the former was watching others in the business not care and still want to do the deal - I had to torpedo it, as there was no way I'd be able to work with this inhumane individual.
I mean - look at the PeOTUS - he's a shining example of what this world now holds as good. Hell, I remember posting 18 months ago about how Holmes wasn't all she seemed to be and HN calling me every shitty name under the sun (I was a misogynist, jealous, rageface, you name it), and yet now that it's the majority view that she's not all she seemed to be, that opinion is fine.
Tribes who blindly support the strong angry man, rather than the honest man. We'd rather go stick heads on poles over a yam theft than admit we didn't plant the yam in the first place. Nothing has changed.
What you are saying is true. Trump got rewarded the presidency for his lack of integrity. The lesson seems to be that only morons allow their sense of integrity to rule them.
Take a straight man like Sanders. He's consistent. When you only work with one reality, as he does, you limit your ability to slip and feint between narratives as trump does, and as a result your appeal is limited to people in that or similar realities.
In short, if you're prepared to cheat, any move is legal, and an opponent playing by the rules cannot win - particularly if you are also the adjudicator.
HN calling me every shitty name
I do have a tendency to be cynical, but I do so based on experience, both first hand and from history.
Its usually a positive signal that mgmt is doing things right, if the smartest people on the team have stuck around for a bit.
I avoid founders\managers\teams\startups with great resumes but lot of churn.
Theranos is without a doubt among the worst companies to ever come out of the Bay Area. They're like a real life UNorth (Michael Clayton film). I hope their collapse is complete, utter and thorough. Everything and everyone in their leadership team painted with that brush for the rest of their career.
The WSJ and their journalist John Carreyrou ought to be commended and probably win a pulitzer for their coverage of Theranos.
Good. They were playing games with people's lives. It is one thing to play startup when it is Uber for Dogs and puppy ended up not seeing its friends at the park that day, it is another thing to mess up blood test results.
If someone who got hurt can come forward and wants to press criminal charges, they should get all the support needed. I can understand mistakes happening, but lying and going forward after they knew was abhorent.
[1] http://www.cnbc.com/2016/04/18/feds-target-theranos-with-cri...
--Theranos President Sunny Balwani to [Theranos employee/whistlblower] Tyler Shultz in a 2014 email
Ouch.
(Tyler is the grandson of fmr Sec. of State/Treasury/Labor George Shultz, who was also a Theranos board member)
Edit: Another quote from the email:
"We saw your email to Elizabeth. Before I get into specifics, let me share with you that had this email come from anyone else in the company, I would have already held them accountable for the arrogant and patronizing tone and reckless comments."
Most of the complaints are either about working hours, or how incredibly out of touch the C-level management is.
[1] https://www.glassdoor.com/Reviews/Theranos-Reviews-E248889.h...
I'm absolutely against ageism, but when you're 95... maybe it's not the period in your life where you should be attempting to vouch for groundbreaking biology on the basis of someone else's claims.
And absolutely agreed, but at the same time I've heard biotech VC firms gave Theranos a pass. But I guess that speaks more to "If you don't have in house expertise, hire someone to perform your technical/scientific due dilligence."
Shultz seems alright. Too bad it takes someone fresh out of school with little to loose and not yet jaded to blow the whistle.
...at least, that's what I understand currently - for all I know they've been so gutted to be completely useless.
That's a very sad thing for Tyler to have to get through. At 95, one can drop dead literally any minute. The fact that elder Schultz is not prioritizing family over the board makes me think the guy is mentally checked out.
She has very probably killed people, ruined families, and caused at least one suicide [1].
And all for what? The company will probably be bankrupt. She'll suffer few consequences, as her connections will probably be enough for her to get a job as, at the very least, a VC or as an entrepreneur-in-residence at a VC firm.
It's incredible.
[1] http://www.businessinsider.com/theranos-ceo-elizabeth-holmes...
Like most sociopaths, she will no doubt reappear in a few years. She'll show up with some well-honed, vague expression of regret and implication that she was overwhelmed by her duty as a woman do accomplish whatever.
> "When Rochelle called Holmes's office to explain what had happened, the secretary was devastated and offered her sincere condolences. She told Rochelle Gibbons that she would let Holmes know immediately. But a few hours later, rather than a condolence message from Holmes, Rochelle instead received a phone call from someone at Theranos demanding that she immediately return any and all confidential Theranos property."
Kissinger, Shultz, William Perry, two Senators, an admiral... Pretty much a who's-who of Department of Defense insiders.
Now, it's entirely likely that these people would be more then happy to push her under the bus.
Her father's with USAID, which does help explain the foreign policy connections.
USAID is much more powerful than is commonly recognized, with an unclassified budget about twice that of the CIA, and is frequently involved in international strategic matters.
So no, it's not the most important adjective.
There's a shortage of ethics across party lines.
At that point it was an internally known failure yet she lied with a straight face. I'm full of contempt for such a creature and full of admiration for Tyler Shultz.
wouldn't a CEO telling material lies about company's product to board members constitute some kind of felony fraud?
http://www.cnbc.com/2016/11/15/theranos-ceo-elizabeth-holmes...
Either that or some ego issues.
But they won't.
0: http://web.archive.org/web/20160821214900/https://hms.harvar...
Quick heuristic: if a startup all of the sudden needs secretary of defense and secretary of state on the board, there is probably shady stuff going on and they need some powerful people with connection to cover it up.
As an aside:
"""One validation report about an Edison test to detect a sexually-transmitted infectious disease said the test was sensitive enough to detect the disease 95% of the time"""
I'm assuming this is reported wrong and it was actually 5% alpha/95% confidence and they were basically p-hacking?
I feel the email from the president was enough to justify the title by saying 'you're connected, which is the only reason I'm responding' but the other comments like 'staff served dinner' and 'lawyers hiding upstairs'.
It would never be a mystery in majority of homes if there was someone waiting in the wings to present papers.
How many other Theranos-like companies is the "Change the world" culture of the valley who refuses to bow down to scrutiny still praising I wonder?
Let this be a lesson, when a company goes mainstream due the eccentricity of its CEO instead than the quality or proved innovation of its services/products that's a red flag, even more so when respected professionals on the area claim the progress such company claims to have made is not feasible...
I have a hunch that Magic Leap will end up being some kind of epic disappointment along the lines of Theranos.
[1] https://blondeempire1.files.wordpress.com/2015/05/simpsonsal...
[1] http://www.vanityfair.com/news/2016/09/elizabeth-holmes-ther...
"The elder Mr. Shultz joined Theranos’s board of directors in 2011. Former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, former Secretary of Defense William Perry, and former Sen. Sam Nunn, all fellows with Mr. Shultz at the Hoover Institution, joined the Theranos board around the same time. They couldn’t be reached for comment.
The unusually high-profile board gave Theranos an aura of power, connections and gravitas as it raised money from investors and developed the blood-testing devices Ms. Holmes touted as revolutionary."
Why would such an array of smart people come on board against their best judgment? Then it hit me, they must be a cabal of vampires that use the blood in furthering their immortality experiments.