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The first part of the book is an account of the first 12 years of the company.

“Bad Blood” is written by John Carreyrou, the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) journalist who uncovered the malpractices of Theranos. In 2018 Holmes was charged with massive fraud, and in that year Theranos ceased operations. When people started to realise the unethical and plain illegal practices necessary to sustain that delusional behaviour, it was too late. But her self-confidence and optimism, fuelled by the “culture of disruption” of Silicon Valley quickly degenerated into delusion, and delusion is contagious. Her intentions were initially in the right place: she really wanted to create something of great value to humanity. This was not a scam intended to fool investors and stakeholders rather, it is the story of a woman who managed to surround herself with powerful men unable to question her unreliable behaviour. But there was one problem: Theranos never developed the technology to do the tests. Holmes raised $900 million in funding and at one point her company was valued at $10 billion. Walgreens entered into a partnership to use Theranos tests in all its pharmacies. Henry Kissinger and George Shultz, both former US Secretaries of State, and William Perry and James Mattis, Secretaries of Defense, sat on the board of directors of Theranos. Holmes raised to stardom as the next Steve Jobs, and the media named her the youngest self made woman billionaire. Quick, painless and cheap, Theranos’ tests would change medical diagnosis forever. The company promised to build a technology capable of performing hundreds of tests using only a few blood drops from a finger prick. Theranos was a medical tech company founded in 2003 by Elisabeth Holmes, a Stanford dropout with a vision to revolutionise blood testing. I found it a fascinating story of how easy is to forgo ethics, misjudge passion, leadership and charisma, and blur the lines between reality and delusion.

The rise and fall of Theranos is the largest scandal in the history of Silicon Valley and a brilliant case of investigative journalism. Published by Knopf, a division of Penguin Random Houseīook review by Andrea Bandelli, Executive Director, Science Gallery International, Dublin, Ireland