I had the pleasure of meeting you in
Hong Kong, obviously, and I have to bring
you back because I think it's so
important for people to hear it.
You mentioned Tyler a few times there.
For people who don't know who he is, just
tell us a little bit about him.
So, Tyler Schultz was also one of the
whistleblowers who came forward and is
on the record. There's actually a group
of us, of around 8 I would say, that
originally came forward and he was the
grandson of George Shultz, who was on the
board of the directors for the
company.
Incredible and I mean the
challenges... Tell me a little bit
just about the experience of being there.
How quickly did you realise at Theranos
that something was terribly wrong?
It took me about a month, a month and a half.
Thanksgiving. It was on Thanksgiving Day
that I realised that there was something...
And what was was Tyler's role? Did it
bring you closer together the fact that
you had all these challenges and all
this stuff thrown at you?
Yeah, so Tyler and I
had initially worked in the same
department and we worked the night shift
so we were called like the Ghosts of
Normandy because we were always there
super late working in the lab and so our
journeys were really interlinked within
the company and it's definitely brought
us together and it's nice having an ally
and sort of a supporter throughout this
this whole process.
It's Tyler that
you have started the new operation with, am I right?
Yes. So, he's part of the founding
team I have another co-founder who's
actually a lawyer, Luke Finn, but Tyler is
also on the founding team and he helps
us.
I'm just interested to know a
little bit as well about the challenges
for Tyler with his grandfather being, I
mean, did he not go to his grandfather
immediately and say "You know what
you've got yourself into?"
So the backstory is actually that Tyler and I quit a day
apart from one another and when I had
had my conversation with Sonny
the day before Tyler had a similar
conversation explaining the errors that
he had seen and what was going on and
the next day I had that conversation
with Sonny. We both quit and then we went
to his grandfather's house to just
try and plea to him that, "Look what
you're seeing is not what you're getting."
His grandfather at this point still
believed in Elizabeth.
He wasn't quite trusting of us or our 
experience of what we had seen.
Do you think there's an element of - I often
think this happens, of youth - because you
were both so young, that I mean
despite the fact that you were well
capable and qualified to see that
something was terribly wrong that it was
hard to have your voice heard?
Yeah, in part and what the lawyers had told us
is it's really a situation of David
versus Goliath, right, where we were
really these small players that were
trying to go up against a lot of really
big players and it would be a bit of a
tough, tough battle.
 
Tell us a little bit about your reaction.
I'm trying to imagine the day that that
letter arrived from the lawyers to your
friend's address.
Yeah.
What did it feel like?
Were you terrified?
I mean the worst part was
actually how I received that letter.
They were sitting outside of my work all
day and had freaked out my co-workers so
I didn't even realise they were sitting
outside of my workplace but my
co-workers had come up to me because I
was working late and they said "We're not
letting you get out of this building
alone. There's been this man that's been
sitting in the parking lot all day and
he's freaking us out." So, they escorted me
out and then the guy had basically
physically handed me the letter and so
y'know, of course I'm freaked out,
because I have this letter but then when
I opened it and saw the address... That's
when I really kind of broke and was very
panicked from that point forward.
Did you have lawyers that you knew or did
somebody advise you? I'm trying to
think what I would do...
Yeah, I had like no
cash in the bank for lawyers at this
point. So, it was a lot of calling of
friends and badgering like anyone who was in
law school, who was a lawyer, or who had a
parent that was a lawyer, trying to get
all the free advice I could possibly get.
But luckily, the one strange thing
about this case was the fact that I was
22/23 (years old). One lawyer had told me if they
did actually sue me, it would go into the
public record.  How were they going to
explain why they were suing a recent
graduate who was 22/23? Hence why I
played the just keep silent until you
absolutely have to lawyer up and and go
to court.
Tell us a little bit more
about the actual whistleblowing process
and who you went to and what the
reaction was.
Yeah, so the actual
whistleblowing process - no one prepares
you on how to do something like this.
Like, I had no idea that you could
actually report to a regulatory agency
until I had talked to the lawyer. But it
was so simple. It was really simple, like,
they need to make it
a little bit easier to figure out what
number you call because it's actually
quite complicated. But all it is -
for me - I was really concerned about
staying anonymous because we had signed
these non-disclosure agreements and
confidentiality agreements and Theranos
made it very, very clear that if we
violated them they would come after us.
But when I called the regulators they
said, "Yeah you can just send an anonymous
email." At that point I was like oh
that's that's so easy! Like sending an
email was, y'know, it'll take no time
whatsoever.
So, once I had figured out how to do that
and actually sent over the email I had
tried to recruit a bunch of other former
employees, to send in other complaints,
who were a bit more qualified. They had
more expertise in the space and honestly
if I had known how to do that
sooner, I would have done it a quite
a long ways back.
It's interesting because you know if you look
at Silicon Valley and you look at other
products with another sector is it may
not... It may be a little bit different, but
a sector like this you're actually
talking about people's lives. Am I
correct that they had already started to
distribute their machines to Walgreens?
So, no... So this is the reason they
were able to get away with this, is they
were exploiting this strange regulatory
loophole. So, in the United States, the
Centre of Medicare and Medicaid services
is in charge of regulating patient
processing
and the FDA is in charge of the
distribution of medical devices, so in
the Centre of Medicare and Medicaid
services, they allow you to have
something called a "laboratory developed
test" and you don't have to get those
approved for like six months until their
development so Theranos was claiming
that they were in LDT, and they weren't
actually distributing any of these
devices. So, what they were allowed to do
was just get the CLIA license and
process patient samples. And, that was
their biggest defence - that they were
able - they were legally doing this the
right way.
And so they were actually
processing them correctly? Not on
their own machine.
Yeah,
they weren't processing them correctly
because things like LDT's were designed,
if you are clinician and you don't want
to pay as much for reagents, so for your
chemicals. So, instead of doing 5
millilitres you'll decide to do 4.5 to
save cost. That's really what the
intention was. It was to cover that, so they
were kind of stretching the limits of
what was allowed and eventually they got
caught, because they were distributing
the nanotainers, which were a medical
device which they didn't get approved
and and they were doing some other stuff
that they just weren't being very
transparent about what was going on.
I mean it's phenomenal the the story is
unbelievable and I don't know how many
of you have seen the HBO documentary?
The Inventor: Out for Blood in Silicon Valley?
Yes, so it's made by Alex Gibney
who I'm an absolutely massive fan of.
He's the guy who made Enron: The
Smartest Guys in the Room, I'm sure
people have seen it. What was the
experience like of doing a documentary? I
mean you were this young woman
idealistic, went into Theranos?
Yeah
And now you're kind of on HBO documentaries and everything.
Yeah, it's been really
surreal to be honest because I had never
intended to go on the record really
because I got pursued for a court case, I
got subpoenaed,
all my documentation went on to public
record .That's kind of why
I went into the public but now it's
been really interesting seeing the sort
of story from my end of the sort of hype
of everything, where you know, I felt like
the lone soldier where I was like "Oh,
it's not what it's cracked up to be." And
then the kind of downfall of everything
but I I think it's good because what
I've realized is that what happened at
Theranos, though it's a sort of
sensational and extreme case, there
are a lot of people out there that
resonate with the story because they've
been put into some similar circumstances. So, to be an ally to those people who
are going through similar situations I
think is a pretty powerful thing and I
think that's the great thing about a
movie like this is that there was actual
heroes and and slowly there has been
justice. Hopefully other individuals
that are in this situation, they can
stand up and do something before it gets
as bad, as Theranos does.
I have to ask you, because I presume
one of the things that would have
appealed to you in the company as well
as this incredible young woman, you know,
at a time when there was no "The Next
Steve Jobs", it had always referred to a guy, and 
suddenly we had Elizabeth Holmes. Was it
sort of doubly disappointing
to you that
the first sort of big thing?
All of it was disappointing, really. All of it.
It was all kind of just tragic, y'know.
In a way, just having so much of...There was so much,
so much about the mission of that
company, you know who Elizabeth Holmes
was, the storyline that I really believed
in and wanted to believe in and kind of
when all that gets exposed it's it's
pretty painful. It's not a fun
process.
I have to confess I was kind of
horrified, you know, we finally have the
female Steve Jobs!
I think the one
benefit we got out of this was Phyllis
Gardiner though, so here is, y'know who
should have been like Elizabeth Holmes
like she just wasn't hyped up but she's
had numerous biotechnology
companies. She's done all of these with a
great amount of integrity and has
influenced and impacted numerous
scientists and female scientists, so
hopefully you know, we start to...
The fact that we're so hungry for a
strong female leader, we start, you know, lifting up these ones that do
exist but maybe didn't get as much
spotlight as they should have.
I mean
I have a background in journalism and
media myself and they did not cover
themselves in glory I think it's fair to
say and it's interesting in the
documentary how defensive and sort of
embarrassed some of the very senior
editors at Forbes and Fortune, etc. I mean
is there just too much hype in Silicon Valley?
Is it just... Do they push so hard that
you're...?
I think with this one, there
was just so much hype with her and
you just didn't anticipate that people
would lie to that degree. I mean there
was the heyday of the Silicon Valley
right? There were all these unicorn
companies, there were just Lyft,
Uber, y'know, all these new tech
companies were coming out, so there was
definitely a lot of excitement and
enthusiasm and maybe with everyone, they
wanted strong
female leaders. They wanted to
support and and highlight what seemed
like a great technology. I don't think
they thought it was hype! It was
unfortunate they thought it was true.
Yeah.
I think that's but they're gonna
kill me backstage, I've broken my own
rule. I'm just so interested to talk to you!
We're running over, so just one last
question I do want to ask you because I
I stayed on Theranos there, but tell me a
little bit more about the current work.
Yes, so
we're a newly launched nonprofit and
we're in the process of building
basically an ethical toolkit to help
train entrepreneurs on the five pillars:
culture, fundraising, generating revenue
building their products, and hiring.
We're partnering with academics, chief
ethics officers, and other experts in the
field to make it easier for people to
know how to deal with these issues if
they stumble upon them.
And where can
people find out more about it?
www.ethicsinentrepreneurship.org
Fantastic.
I'm gonna leave it there.
God, I could talk to you for another hour! Thanks so much, Erika.
