Elizabeth Holmes

Once hailed as the youngest self-made female billionaire, Elizabeth Holmes is best known for founding the failed blood-testing startup Theranos in 2003 when she was 19. After Theranos's technology was found to be faulty, Holmes was sentenced to 11 years in federal prison in 2022 for defrauding investors.

During a Mandarin immersion program in China the summer before she started college, Holmes met 37-year-old Sunny Balwani, who would later become not only the COO of Theranos but also her romantic partner. She attended Stanford University from 2002 to 2004, when she dropped out to work on Theranos. The company raised hundreds of millions of dollars, reaching a $9B valuation at its peak. Investors included Rupert Murdoch and Walmart's Walton family, and board members ranged from Henry Kissinger to George Shultz.

However, Theranos' core claim—that its blood-testing device could detect many diseases with just a pinprick of blood—was ultimately a lie, despite partnerships with major pharmacies like Walgreens that added to Theranos' credibility. Theranos dissolved in 2018 after a 2015 Wall Street Journal investigation led by writer John Carreyrou exposed that Theranos' Edison blood-testing machines did not work as the company claimed. The machines gave many people false test results, leading to patient harm.