Roper could not verify the science behind her Theranos test

Transcript

Transcribed by machine (Whisper) from the episode’s audio, so a word may be off here and there.

1. 2:24

   You were, I think, the first person to interview Elizabeth Holmes for a magazine. What was that like? It was the end of 2013, and I was an editor at Wired Magazine, and I was looking for founders for us to cover and include in something. And always, as one of few women editors, I was looking for women founders. And I found this mention in the Wall Street Journal of Elizabeth Holmes. And so I did some research and, you know, there weren't any magazine stories or profiles or interviews. And I reached out to Theranos and got a yes to come down and interview her.

2. 3:08

   So I walked into a, you know, at the Theranos offices, I wasn't allowed to go anywhere else other than the room that we were in, which had a phlebotomist to take my blood, and then also a place for me to sit with Elizabeth. And that's when I met her. Most notable immediately was what seemed like an affectation of her voice. It seemed kind of. odd she was wearing her steve jobs outfit and she had on like red lipstick um so and she had this sort of you know this this thing that now we've become quite aware of but this kind of big blue eyed stare you know kind of still and looking directly at you um and and i asked her a bunch of questions now of course like uh i was i you know wired in general at that time especially was their orientation really was on innovation and celebration of that innovation and i was

3. 4:01

   I was actually genuinely excited to meet a founder who was working in biotech instead of, you know, trying to make food delivery faster or cars come quicker, you know, and it felt like significantly more interesting to me. The part about her pitch that was about reducing health care costs, making transparent blood tests results to patients and potentially disrupting Medicare, you know, I thought that was that was pretty cool and I was excited to be there.

4. 4:31

   So I interviewed her for about an hour, and then I had my blood drawn by a phlebotomist. So that was like the teeny tiny vial that you've seen in pictures, like a teeny tiny vial. And because I was dealing with some medical stuff at the time, I asked for the same panel that I had just had so that I could compare the results of my panel and the Theranos panel. Wow, you did more than a lot of her investors.

5. 4:58

   well i mean i there was no i mean obviously and you guys know this but like there was no verifiable science i couldn't see the lab i couldn't talk to a lead scientist in some ways she was sort of standing in for the lead scientist in the way that she talked about about the company and of course she was also talking about new science right um genetic testing of the blood in this different way but anyway they took my blood and i did look at the panel against mine And it was very much similar data to the same tests, like basically, like, you know, not exactly, but very, very close.

6. 5:29

   Of course, since then, I've wondered, where was it tested? How did they do it since it was such a small amount of blood? It wasn't a pinprick, but it was like that tiny vial. And so, you know, I had I don't want to go on because I've said so much already. But like, there's lots of things about like the experience of spending time with her that were interesting and odd. And I think, you know, if I had to characterize some of that, I would say I believe she had conviction.

7. 5:53

   about what she was doing. Yeah. I mean, we definitely want to put a pin in that and get back to that because I think a lot of what we're going to be talking about is Elizabeth Holmes' conviction