Headline September 25, 2018/'' ' SILICON VALLEY *SILOS*' ''

'' ' SILICON VALLEY *SILOS*' ''

YOU GREAT HEROES OF : *TECHNOLOGY - COMMUNICATION AND INNOVATION* on *All Data Protection Acts* with who should-

The World Students Society ALIGN? United States? Europe? China? Russia or maybe we ought to work up our own Master Act?...........

Merium? Rabo? Saima? Sara? Dee? Zainab? Haleema? Zilli? Juniper/Japan?
Dantini/Malaysia? Aqsa? Seher/UK? Emaan? Armeen? Lakhsmi/India? Shahbano? Nina?

Hussain? Shahzeb?  Haider? Jordan? Bilal? Salar? Reza/Canada? Faraz? Umer? Ali? Awais? Wajahat? Umair? Ehsan?  Ghazi?

A FEW YEARS AGO Elizabeth Holmes, boss of Theranos, dressed up as Queen Elizabeth 1 for the  company's Halloween party.

At the time she reigned over Silicon Valley's startup scene. In 2013-15 she raised around $700 million to fund her firm, which had supposedly developed a way to test blood with a single pinprick.

Ms Holmes was hailed as the next Steve Job and the youngest female billionaire in History. At its peak, Theranos claimed a private valuation of $9 billion. But the startup throne is precarious.

''BAD BLOOD'', an enjoyable book by John Carreyrrou, an investigative journalist, charts Ms. Holmes's rise and dramatic fall. It was Mr. Carreyrou who first raised questions about Theranos, suggesting in the Wall Street Journal in 2015 that its testing technique yielded unreliable results.

Earlier this year Ms. Holmes settled civil charges brought by American financial regulator, the  Securities and Exchange Commission {SEC} of defrauding investors. A criminal inquiry is believed to be in the train. What went wrong?

Mr. Carreyrou suggests Ms. Holmes cared less for patients than about advancing her own interests and personal brand.

According to the SEC, she and Sunny Balwani, her deputy [and, says Mr. Carreyrou, secretly her boyfriend], misled investors and other corporations about the state of Theranos's technology and sales.

These falsehoods lured new partners. For example, Safeway, a grocery chain and Walgreens, a pharmacy giant, respectively stumped up around $400 million and $140 million to collaborate with Theranos.

Ms. Holmes is not the only one implicated in the debacle. It highlights the Valley's propensity to glorify lone, inexperienced entrepreneurs who promise to reshape an industry- and enrich those who spot them early.

Ms. Holmes's partners and investors desperately wanted to believe that a young woman could get to the top. Her face was plastered on magazine covers, even as she refused to reveal the details of her firm's technology.

Too little scrutiny was offered by the older men on her board, who eventually included Henry Kissenger and George Shultz [ both former secrataries of state].
Mr carreyrou says the board had been set to sack Ms Holmes in 2008, but she wrangled another chance.

In reality, Theranos's  tests were never as sound as the firm claimed. Instead of admitting that the technology was not ready to deploy, Thranos ''hacked'' a solution using modified traditional devices from other manufacturers.

Perhaps Ms Holes was a adhering to the Valley's spirit of disruption by improvising a fix. That might work for software and Internet firms. In the health care business the stakes are higher.

The book is especially engaging on Ms Homes battle with the author himself. She tried to squelch Mr Carreyrou's initial expose, going so far as to recruit Rupert Murdoch, the journal's proprietor, as an investor. [He put $125 million into Theranos in 2015, a stake that is now worthless].

Mr Carreyrou is weaker on Ms Holmes's psychology. He never got close enough to her or her confidants to illuminate her motives. One striking oversight is an examination  the origin of her company's origins. Ms Holmes apparently wrote a patient application for a  medical device  after a year at Stanford University and a summer internship in Singapore.

Mr Carreyrou recounts this creation myth without comment. Still, the story and its telling are not over yet. A Hollywood film starring Jennifer Lawrence as Ms Holmes is in the works.

With respectful dedication to the Students, Professors and Teachers of the world. See Ya all  ''register''  on : www.wssciw.blogspot.com and..............  Twitter-!E-WOW! - the Ecosystem 2011:

'''Queen & Castles'''

Good Night and God Bless

SAM Daily Times - the Voice of the Voiceless