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Major Investor Sues Theranos

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Re: Major Investor Sues Theranos

#121

Post by rdtsc »

Fricken wrote: post #81
alexqgb wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The fact that Madoff's intent was criminal from the outset and that Holmes' probably wasn't is irrelevant. The point is that it became criminal. And that's why she's in the firing line today.

At what point did she shift from being an optimistic entrepeneur to a criminal? Was it when she started getting magazine covers? Was it when Hwnry Kissinger joined the board of directors? She's still giving her company 110% in spite of everything that has transpired. Usually the correct time for a startup founder/CEO to call it quits is when they run out of capital, until then it's their job to try and make it work c…

> At what point did she shift from being an optimistic entrepeneur to a criminal?

Going out on a limb here, I would say when found out their machine didn't provide accurate results. Yet waited until threatened to be closed for two years before voiding results. This is not Uber for Dogs, and puppy doesn't get to the park to play with its friends, but potentially life or death situations. We are not talking just a 0.01% error rate, this is stuff like like 20-40% error rates in some tests.

> Was it when Hwnry Kissinger joined the board of directors?

Well, some would say it would be a warning sign, for sure ;-)

Re: Major Investor Sues Theranos

#122

Post by cko »

bbarn wrote: post #52
julianpye wrote: post #6

One thing I find really weird is the choice of CEO photos in media reporting. If there is good news, they chose 'nice', attractive photos. If there is bad news, they look for worse ones. This is true for male and female founders. In this case, everything about this photo is an 'outtake', from hands, choice of framing, facial expression, eyes - it's a photo a photographer would not keep in their image selection.

She looks insane in every photo I've ever seen of her. Even the company vetted ones her eyes are always wide open and she looks nervous.

She looks ok in google image searches. I'd personally like to meet her just to find out how she convinced so many people to invest in her company.

Re: Major Investor Sues Theranos

#123

Post by seesomesense »

julianpye wrote: post #6

One thing I find really weird is the choice of CEO photos in media reporting. If there is good news, they chose 'nice', attractive photos. If there is bad news, they look for worse ones. This is true for male and female founders. In this case, everything about this photo is an 'outtake', from hands, choice of framing, facial expression, eyes - it's a photo a photographer would not keep in their image selection.

" If there is good news, they chose 'nice', attractive photos. If there is bad news, they look for worse ones. "

Thank you. I found that insightful. I must confess that I never noticed that before ( but I am not a people person )

Re: Major Investor Sues Theranos

#124

Post by oneloop »

FireBeyond wrote: post #113
oneloop wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Probably. I'd imagine that's why Theranos will insist part of the deal is that the exact terms will never be disclosed.

Their other investors will be entitled to the balance sheets as is. They can't just say "and an undisclosed sum to [prior investor]" and redact their balance and liabilities. To the public, yes.

Hah good point. So Theranos is literally fighting for their lives, because if one investor gets 25% of their money back, all the other investors will want the same.

Re: Major Investor Sues Theranos

#125

Post by Alex3917 »

julianpye wrote: post #6

One thing I find really weird is the choice of CEO photos in media reporting. If there is good news, they chose 'nice', attractive photos. If there is bad news, they look for worse ones. This is true for male and female founders. In this case, everything about this photo is an 'outtake', from hands, choice of framing, facial expression, eyes - it's a photo a photographer would not keep in their image selection.

> This is true for male and female founders.

It's not just founders, think about the pictures of Obama and O.J. where they were made blacker. Or the images of James Holmes or Saddam.

People will actually complain and threaten to kill the magazine editors if they don't make the 'bad guys' look evil enough; look at what happened with the Rolling Stone photo of the Boston Marathon bomber.

Re: Major Investor Sues Theranos

#126

Post by seizethecheese »

pcurve wrote: post #73
Fricken wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The managers of this hedge fund handed over $100 million dollars in other people's money without so much as a whiff of due diligence. There are 13 major life sciences venture capital firms and not one of then would touch Theranos with a ten foot pole. You'd think, in theory, that whomever it was at Partner Management LP who makes the big investment decisions would make a few phone calls first before deciding to pull…

Exactly. parking 2.5% of its total capital in Theranos deserves suits from its own investors.

Which might explain the motive behind this suit...

Re: Major Investor Sues Theranos

#128

Post by schappim »

mikeash wrote: post #120
shard972 wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The only way Theranos could be analogous to Musk is if he had got up on that stage in Guadalajara and said "we have a Mars rocket ready to go, we've tested it extensively, it works, we'll begin commercial flight soon, the line for reservations is on your left, please bring your checkbooks." Devils advocate but isn't that what SpaceX told facebook when launching their satellite? I would assume they asked for money t…

There's no comparison to be made between an accident occurring in an inherently risky field and peddling technology that you know doesn't work. Nitpick mode: Facebook didn't own that satellite and their only involvement in it was a plan (now, obviously, altered) to lease a decent chunk (but by no means all) of its capacity from its owner once it was operational. I'm not sure why everyone decided it was Facebook's sat…

It makes for a better story!

Re: Major Investor Sues Theranos

#129

Post by chrsstrm »

CarpetBench wrote: post #102
chrsstrm wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I think humanity is literally evolving to lie and cheat at a biological level. It's naive to think we were not already born with these core qualities. "Survive at all costs" is a demonstrated maxim that all living beings possess. We didn't consider lying and cheating to be frowned upon until we decided we were a civilized society with rules based on [opinions | deities | etc.]. Having experienced multiple pathologic…

> We didn't consider lying and cheating to be frowned upon until we decided we were a civilized society with rules based on Eh, what? Where are you getting that from? Any organism with cooperative dynamics also has to contend with cheaters, and yet cooperation is extremely prevalent in nature. There's a reason parasitism isn't considered the norm in the animal kingdom. I sincerely doubt that primitive human tribes wi…

  > I sincerely doubt that primitive human tribes widely tolerated healthy adults who contributed absolutely nothing to the group.
It's certainly not hard to imagine that no, they would not have tolerated such behavior. But does this mean that you are suggesting the members of this tribe convened and decided to put rules in place to define a member's behavior and potentially institute punishment if these rules were broken? That sounds suspiciously like a society. It's almost as if the larger population felt that attempting to hinder a particular perceived flaw in human nature was a net positive for the group as a whole.

The existence of cooperation or the desire to cooperate does not disprove that cheating and lying are embedded instincts in living beings. Cheating and cooperation are not mutually exclusive concepts. The parent comment was suggesting that we are somehow evolving to lie and cheat and I'm suggesting that we have been more than capable of this behavior all along. In fact, I've gone so far as to say that not only were we immediately capable since the dawn of humankind, but we have actively suppressed these "survival skills" because they are deemed bad qualities.

Re: Major Investor Sues Theranos

#130

Post by jarsin »

oneloop wrote: post #96
Fricken wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What Madoff did was illegal and malicious from the outset. Do you believe that when Holmes was handed the opportunity, at 19, to bring the Edison to market that she set out with the intent of defrauding investors? The only thing she's provably guilty of thus far is believing in her company a little more than is sensible and being preternaturally competent as a fundraiser. When Musk claims he can get people to Mars fo…

How do you know that Madoff was malicious from the outset, I wonder? The guy had a 30 year career, have you studied his beginnings? Maybe you did, but knowing nothing I'd find it more plausible that the guy started small fudging a couple of numbers hoping the next year would be better and eventually snowballed out of control.

He was not always a scammer. He ran a top market making business in his early days and served as chairman of nasdaq etc.

That gave him the clout he needed. Then he used that clout to scam wealthy people starting in the 90's.

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