Former Theranos Prez Sunny Balwani gets 13 years in prison for fraud
Ramesh 'Sunny' Balwani, the President and COO of the now-defunct healthcare technology company Theranos, has been sentenced to prison for fooling the public into trusting their fraudulent blood-testing startup.
Following in the footsteps of his former partner (in crime) and Theranos founder and CEO Elizabeth Holmes, Balwani was sentenced to 12 years and 11 months in prison with 3 years of probation by US District Court Judge Edward Davila.
- While Holmes was found guilty on four counts and sentenced to 11 years and 3 months in prison in a separate trial, jurors found Balwani guilty on all 12 fraud counts filed by federal prosecutors.
In her testimony, Holmes claimed that Balwani had allegedly abused and manipulated her, using coercion to get her to lie to the investors about their startup.
What was Theranos: Once valued at $10 billion at its peak in 2013 and 2014, Theranos was hailed by the two as cutting edge healthcare, boasting revolutionary new blood tests that required very small amounts of blood and that could be performed rapidly and accurately, all using compact automated devices which the company had developed. These claims were later proven to be false.
Here’s a quick look at Balwani’s life and eventual fall from grace:
- Born Ramesh Balwani in Sindh, Pakistan in 1965, Balwani attended school in Lahore before having to move to India because of his status as a Hindu in a Muslim-majority country. His family then migrated to the United States where he eventually received a bachelor’s degree in Information Systems from the University of Texas.
- Balwani worked at Microsoft and Lotus Software as a products salesman to other firms where he met Keiko Fujimoto, the Japanese artist he went on to marry. He made $40 million after selling his shares to the tech startup CommerceBid.com, for which he served as president shortly.
- Balwani went on to receive a Master’s in Business Administration from the University of Berkeley, California before finally encountering Elizabeth Holmes on a trip to China in 2002. Before they began dating, Balwani allegedly served as a mentor to Holmes, the two sharing a platonic relationship when he was 37 and she was 18.
Though they started living together by 2005, the couple hid their existence from the public to keep it a secret from investors. Following their split in 2016, Theranos began to crumble.
- While Holmes is currently pregnant and will not have to surrender until April next year, Balwani is supposed to surrender to be taken into custody on March 15, 2023.
In pop culture: A Hulu limited series documenting the events that led up to the fall of Theranos, The Dropout, starring Amanda Seyfried and Naveen Andrews is currently streaming on Disney+ Hotstar. Another movie on Elizabeth Holmes is in the works, with Jennifer Lawrence playing the former Theranos CEO. However, there's no word on its filming or release date so far. A documentary, The Inventor: Out for Blood in Silicon Valley, also details Holmes's rise and fall.