Former Defense Secretary Jim Mattis testified in Theranos fraud trial
On Wednesday, Former Defense Secretary Jim Mattis testified in Theranos' fraud trial against entrepreneur Elizabeth Holmes, saying that he had been given a false impression about the capability of blood testing product put forward by her now defunct company Theranos.
The testimony from Mattis, who served on the Board of the company for three years is a central part of the prosecution case, characterizing the fallen Silicon Valley star as a savvy operator who misled investors.
Regardless of the outcome of the trial, the Holmes saga has already cast a shadow over women-led startups, particularly in the health sector. Is it a surprise that Yahoo Finance had no impact on consumer trust in home DNA testing company 23 and me ME CEO Anne Wojcicki tells ME in a new interview :
Wojcicki rejected comparisons between 23 andMe and Theranos, emphasizing the science-driven culture at 23 and Me while noting that the outsized attention paid to Theranos owes in part to the gender of its founder.
Wojcicki says a culture of transparency goes back to my college thesis on choice and transparency, going back to my answer. We are an incredibly science-driven company. Theranos was never transparent, she adds. To be honest, Theranos was new because again you had a woman running it. There are other companies that are also not transparent, who don't get the same kind of publicity. 23 andMe, which went public through a SPAC merger three months ago, earned the first Food and Drug Administration FDA approval for a direct consumer DNA test that revealed a patient's genetic predisposition to certain diseases in 2017.
The approval came four years after the FDA sent a warning letter to 23 andMe urging it to stop marketing its home DNA tests because the company had not shown sufficient evidence that its product's findings were accurate.
A boom in at home DNA test sales from 2015 to 2018 culminated with as many customers purchasing such tests in 2018 that did all previous years, according to an analysis by the MIT Technology Review. But sales of tests slumped over the ensuing years, causing layoffs at 23 andMe in early 2020.
Wojcicki acknowledge that the decline in sales of at-home DNA tests sprung in part from the rise of privacy concerns in recent years, pointing to Cambridge Analytica scandal in 2018 that showed Facebook FB had shared data on millions of users with the consulting firm without their consent.
The company has seen a recovery in the market since COVID - 19 reignited consumer interest in health care, Wojcicki said.
Wojcicki, who has led 23 andMe since its founding in 2006, spent almost a decade on Wall Street as a health care analyst. Her scientific background dates back at least as far as her University studies at Yale, where she earned a B.Tech in biology.
Speaking to Yahoo Finance, she urged greater transparency in the health sector, including a robust watchdog role for FDA.
The heightened scrutiny of all companies, I think is fabulous, she says. I think this is where the FDA has a real responsibility and a real opportunity to make sure that they're setting standards, she adds.
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