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This CEO is out for blood

fortune.com

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Re: This CEO is out for blood

#61

Post by MaysonL »

Alupis wrote: post #45
jbail wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you're underestimating her intelligence and capabilities. Clearly she had the background and the initiative. There are super smart and dedicated people out there. She sounds like one of them. Beyond that, I'm not sure if the patent is absurd or not...but I definitely don't think its absurd for a 19 year old woman to write up and be awarded a patent.

No, I was meaning I find it highly unlikely she understood or could actually implement the technology behind her patent. A 19 year old, no matter how smart, is not likely to have a thorough enough background to understand all of the related technologies involved in this patent. This is a medical device, and has to be "done right", or people can be injured or worse. I don't expect even a top-tier CS student could pull…

Back in 1963, I was tutored in calculus by a 15-year old who won that year's Science Talent Search for his research in nuclear magnetic resonance. He had completed essentially all of undergrad math and physics. I think you have a badly warped view of what is possible for smart people, whatever age.

Re: This CEO is out for blood

#62

Post by w1ntermute »

Alupis wrote: post #56
ladytron wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Her father. Holmes comes from a very wealthy and prominent family. Her father, Christian Holmes IV, has had many high ranking jobs in government. I'm assuming the board was built from his numerous government and family wealth connections. Coming from wealth doesn't hurt but somehow the articles always leave that bit out ...

> Coming from wealth doesn't hurt but somehow the articles always leave that bit out ... It's not a "sexy" PR piece if the story reads "Wealthy people get Wealthier", now is it? ;-P

Now that's not necessarily true: http://www.businessweek.com/printer/articles/203578-pikettys...

Re: This CEO is out for blood

#64

Post by ladytron »

Alupis wrote: post #35
rayiner wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I skimmed through the first part, but based on your comment I went back and read the article. > As a bonus, board meetings are also attended by the company’s de facto legal adviser at large, trial lawyer David Boies. Boies represented the DOJ in the Microsoft antitrust proceedings and Al Gore in Bush v. Gore. What an odd cast for a startup board. I wonder what connects all these people, other than all being high-prof…

Seems rather sad state of our Patent system here in the US where a 19 year old with no prior technical background, who was a Chemical Engineering student, a sophomore no less (meaning barely finished or finishing General Ed. requirements and just starting Major courses), can write and file for a highly-technical patent involving radios, sensors, embedded devices, and the like. > And we could put a cellphone chip on i…

With "resources" and "consultants, work for hire" anyone with funds can write a pretty decent patent application and drive it through the system.

When you file a patent application you can say it's pending, raise funds on it, get yourself a decent engineer, and file a continuation later with more "meat".

Patents are an expensive game.

Re: This CEO is out for blood

#65

Post by jessaustin »

Holmes had then just spent the summer working in a lab at the Genome Institute in Singapore, a post she had been able to fill thanks to having learned Mandarin in her spare hours as a Houston teenager.

Everyone knows that English is spoken in Singapore, right? I'm not saying Mandarin wouldn't look good on a resume, but very few Singaporeans with the education to work in that facility would not also be fluent in the international language of science. Even if her work took place in community clinics, Mandarin wouldn't have been as helpful as e.g. Hokkien.

EDIT: Since it's kind of lame that such a nitpick is still at the top, I'd like to address this also:

Its advances relate to "optimizing the chemistry" and "leveraging software" to permit those conventional methods to work with tiny sample volumes.

IANABiochemist, but they're talking about statistical methods here, right? My intuition is that a particular test performed at "nano"-scale might not be very accurate, but that a series of such tests could be as accurate as required.

Re: This CEO is out for blood

#66

Post by MaysonL »

gone35 wrote: post #46
OrwellianChild wrote: post #27

Can someone help me on the technical aspects of the blood tests they've developed? The premise appears to be that they take extremely small samples ("25 to 50 microliters") and run lots of tests ("as many as 70 different tests from a single draw") using "the same fundamental chemical methods". This compares with standard blood tests which require 2 orders of magnitude more blood ("numerous tubes of blood, each contai…

Can someone help me on the technical aspects of the blood tests they've developed? On the specifics, I'm afraid nobody can for now. They have refused to peer-review their protocols and validation data, so their assays are essentially a black box. So far, incredibly, they have managed to get away with this thanks to a glaring regulatory loophole (as the article explains); but sooner or later they'll have to open up if…

Note however that they are applying for FDA approval of all their proprietary tests.

Re: This CEO is out for blood

#67

Post by w1ntermute »

jessaustin wrote: post #65

Holmes had then just spent the summer working in a lab at the Genome Institute in Singapore, a post she had been able to fill thanks to having learned Mandarin in her spare hours as a Houston teenager. Everyone knows that English is spoken in Singapore, right? I'm not saying Mandarin wouldn't look good on a resume, but very few Singaporeans with the education to work in that facility would not also be fluent in the i…

I immediately picked up on that as well. Along with the whole "selling C++ compilers to Chinese universities in the late 90s" thing, it makes the article seem rather poorly researched and overly adulatory.

Re: This CEO is out for blood

#68

Post by jacquesm »

Alupis wrote: post #48
jacquesm wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Seems rather sad state of our Patent system here in the US where a 19 year old with no prior technical background, who was a Chemical Engineering student, a sophomore no less (meaning barely finished or finishing General Ed. requirements and just starting Major courses), can write and file for a highly-technical patent involving radios, sensors, embedded devices, and the like. > It's very doubtful she understood ho…

I'm really not sure why you are attempting to make this a gender issue. If you re-read my comment, gender is not even approached. To summarize my post - I was making a statement regarding how absurd (imho) it is that someone can patent something they are not technically capable of even implementing. It is patentable because here in the US, patents are really just "ideas", so you don't have to actually implement the p…

You should not be questioning the patent based on the person but on the contents of the patent. I know some 19 year olds that would absolutely astound you with what they are capable of. One of the things this website has taught me is to completely overlook the age factor.

Re: This CEO is out for blood

#70

Post by larrys »

w1ntermute wrote: post #53
Procrastes wrote: post #7

> “I realized that I could have just as well been looking into the eyes of a Steve Jobs or a Bill Gates.” > Though Theranos is largely unknown even in Silicon Valley, that is about to change. > Precisely how Theranos accomplishes all these amazing feats is a trade secret. > The analyzers look like large desktop computer towers. Holmes declines to explain how they work, or even allow them to be photographed, citing th…

Here's how Theranos got all those high profile board members: http://fortune.com/2014/06/12/theranos-board-directors/ TL;DR: founder met/convinced one well-connected DC insider in 2011, and he brought all his buddies along for the ride.

Also noting that with the exception of Frist a quick read shows no connection to healthcare.

As others noted these board members appear for another purpose such as government issues or attracting others by the halo of their importance.

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