Team Number 6 Aj Valor Haley Asanovich MasonGreen Ethan Kaiser

Elizabeth Holmes’ Interests: in FAVOR of continuing Edison research.

Elizabeth Anne Holmes is a revolutionary engineer who greatly changed the blood-testing industry in early 2015. attended in California and trained as an engineer until her decision to drop out of school and pursue a more individualistic and innovative dream of creating her own blood work company. In 2003, as a nineteen year old, Elizabeth Holmes founded

Theranos, a no longer functioning company used for blood testing in shockingly small volumes. Elizabeth innovated and revolutionized her labs in Silicon Valley from the second she started her company there.

After raising 400 million dollars through campaigning, and gaining trust from investors for research and development, Theranos was valued at 9 billion dollars in 2015. At the same time, Elizabeth owned over

50% of the company, making her the youngest billionaire on Forbes to date.

Elizabeth was a young woman executive in a male dominated Silicon Valley. Her age, gender, and drive to push the social and scientific norm of the time raised a lot of eyebrows and doubters.

Doubters who still to this day do not believe her hard work and research could help improve the lives of every american forever. Due to mass amounts of skepticism, extreme amounts of investigation and major pressure from the media, it forced Theranos to produce a product. “First they call you crazy, then they fight you, and all of the sudden you change the world”. When Elizabeth first presented her ideas to the public, no one believed she could. Now there are companies very similar to Theranos that are developing blood testing technology, just like the type everyone told Elizabeth was not possible to make.

Theranos is the combination of therapy and diagnosis. The company was funded in Silicon Valley in the Stanford Research Park (SRP). According to the SRP website “the Park draws groundbreaking startups, established R&D companies and the research branches of Fortune 500 companies to our community of innovators”. With access to research and talent from nearby Stanford University, SRP companies are uniquely positioned for success. The beauty of SRP is that private startups can stay private and not have to answer to the nosy media, or the competing companies waiting for a slip up. A slip up, such as an unintentional mistake, would allow some foresight for companies to discover information to build from to help themselves. Imagine if companies as groundbreaking and innovative as Apple or Tesla would not have kept their ideas and visions private. If instead, they had gone public right away, anyone who had an opportunity to steal ideas would have taken advantage. Elizabeth’s goal for the company was to determine the onset of disease before therapy to change outcomes for the better. From the get-go, the company was aimed at disrupting the inefficiency and expensiveness of blood testing and medical treatment.

Elizabeth wanted to create a machine that could take your blood sample from the prick of your finger and produce results in a quick and easy to read manner. She called the machine Edison, and with more development and research, there would have been an Edison in a lot of homes world-wide. The machine could have revolutionized blood tests and lab work in the United States drastically. Blood Tests in the United States are not only time consuming and hard to interpret on your own, but also too expensive for some individuals who still have a right to know their results, even if unaffordable. Theranos was a vision and a path set out by Elizabeth working to invent an integrated solution where everyone can have access to the wealth of information achieved from the tiny drops of blood. The inexpensiveness and efficiency that Holmes envisioned, would provide would then allow for more frequent blood check ups and a healthier idea of what is going on in one's body.

Checking your blood every month or so to see changes and spot signs of early diseases could have an impact on countless families whose loved ones could detect a likely fatal disease before it takes an unfortunate turn. When Theranos was thriving the most it had employed was around 800 employees.

According to the HBO documentary most of the team members at the company “felt that they were on the path of being able to make machines like Edison for everyone”.

The media, the government's power over producers and consumers forced Theranos to produce a version of Edison that with a bit more intrinsic research and time, could have provided life changing results not only for it’s patients, but for individuals and the private health sector overall in the future. Like all good things in life innovation for blood work cannot come easy. It needs full support and time to develop without pressure. Holmes just needed a bit more time for Edison. The vision and the drive was there. The design was almost reaching a breakthrough. If Elizabeth’s energy could have been focused fully on Edison and away from all the pressures and doubt around her. The motivation and shared dream of a better human life were all there for Holmes. However, The lack of support and patience from the government, competing companies, and all of the sceptics in the media in general, pressured Theranos to cut their research short and slowed down the full potential of the company.

A company called Truvian Sciences has now claim “Truvian Sciences uses 7 drops of blood to produce lab accurate results in 20 minutes for a full suite of health tests' ' according to medcitynews.com.

The article also stated that Truvian Sciences is developing an automated benchtop broad panel testing system on a “small sample of blood” to support in which the company just raised $27.1 million. This also seems very familiar. It seems the company has taken a page out of Elizabeth’s bashed ideas and made it their own. Imagine if five years ago, like Theranos, Truvian Sciences would have come out and proposed their science. Sadly I would say everyone would doubt them just the same.

Nowadays companies like Truvian Sciences are working to accomplish what Elizabeth knew could happen with a bit of time, trust, and enthusiasm. Even university departments have begun to create automated blood testing devices. According to ScienceDaily.com, Researchers at Rutgers University have created an automated blood drawing and testing device that provides rapid results. This device is envisioned to potentially improve the workflow in hospitals and other health-related institutions. With

Elizabeth’s drive, new technological research equipment and access to more research facilities in the SRP,

Theranos could be a massive company in 2019. When you’re developing the future you don’t know the impact because no one has seen it before. Elizabeth had the dream, the drive, and determination. The public just did not provide her with the patience, privacy, and positive reinforcement needed. Thomas

Edison said “I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work”. Elizabeth should be given another try. A second chance to help everyone around her be more knowledgeable and in control of our health.

Sources:

Parmar, Arundhati. “Truvian Sciences Raises $27.1M for a Testing System Needing Only ‘a Small Sample of Blood.’” MedCity News, MedCity News, 20 Nov. 2019, medcitynews.com/2019/11/truvian- sciences-raises-27-1m-for-a-testing-system-needing-only-a-small-sample-of-blood/?rf=1.

Rutgers University. "Automated robotic device for faster blood testing: New technology could speed hospital work, enhance ." ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, 13 June 2018. .

“Theranos.” , Wikimedia Foundation, 20 Nov. 2019, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theranos.