She was the brilliant founder of a multibillion-dollar company, but in the end everything about Elizabeth Holmes was fake — including her voice.
That’s according to a new article published in Vanity Fair by reporter Nick Bilton, who has extensively followed Theranos’ downfall over the years.
In his latest piece, Bilton paints a picture of a compulsive liar who resorted to increasingly erratic behaviour in her company’s dying days.
And while many allegations of her business deceits have been well-documented, according to a slew of former employees and other sources who reached out to Bilton, her lies could also be astoundingly “small and petty” and personal in nature.
Even her trademark deep, baritone voice is apparently false — a claim previously covered in The Wall Street Journal reporter John Carreyrou’s book on Ms Holmes’ disgrace, Bad Blood.
In the book, he shares an anecdote from a Theranos worker who remembered details of a meeting with an excited Ms Holmes held late one afternoon.
She forgot to put on the baritone voice and went back into a more natural-sounding young woman’s voice,” the book states.
And in a 2005 interview for the TechNation Radio podcast, Ms Holmes can also be heard using her higher-pitched, natural voice for a few seconds before apparently realising her mistake and reverting back to her usual deep tone.
It is believed Ms Holmes adopted the deeper voice in an attempt to appear more authoritative and commanding.
Meanwhile, in recent days, a string of other ex-employees have also reached out to Bilton to share other discrepancies.
For example, Ms Holmes would famously boast about being well-read, claiming to be able to quote Jane Austen and regularly referring to works of philosophy.
But according to Bilton, “colleagues who questioned her about the canon found Holmes’s intellect was mostly superficial”.
It doesn’t end there. Ms Holmes once told The New Yorker she “doesn’t date” — but at the same time, she was in the middle of a relationship with Theranos’ chief operating officer Sunny Balwani.
And in a previous article, Bilton described how Ms Holmes’ dog, Balto, was named after a famous husky that had led an expedition carrying medicine to fight an outbreak of diphtheria in 1925.
But even that was untrue — the original Balto only completed around 88km of the dangerous trek, taking all the credit and media attention while a different dog completed the entire 420km trip.
That’s according to a new article published in Vanity Fair by reporter Nick Bilton, who has extensively followed Theranos’ downfall over the years.
In his latest piece, Bilton paints a picture of a compulsive liar who resorted to increasingly erratic behaviour in her company’s dying days.
And while many allegations of her business deceits have been well-documented, according to a slew of former employees and other sources who reached out to Bilton, her lies could also be astoundingly “small and petty” and personal in nature.
Even her trademark deep, baritone voice is apparently false — a claim previously covered in The Wall Street Journal reporter John Carreyrou’s book on Ms Holmes’ disgrace, Bad Blood.
In the book, he shares an anecdote from a Theranos worker who remembered details of a meeting with an excited Ms Holmes held late one afternoon.
She forgot to put on the baritone voice and went back into a more natural-sounding young woman’s voice,” the book states.
And in a 2005 interview for the TechNation Radio podcast, Ms Holmes can also be heard using her higher-pitched, natural voice for a few seconds before apparently realising her mistake and reverting back to her usual deep tone.
It is believed Ms Holmes adopted the deeper voice in an attempt to appear more authoritative and commanding.
Meanwhile, in recent days, a string of other ex-employees have also reached out to Bilton to share other discrepancies.
For example, Ms Holmes would famously boast about being well-read, claiming to be able to quote Jane Austen and regularly referring to works of philosophy.
But according to Bilton, “colleagues who questioned her about the canon found Holmes’s intellect was mostly superficial”.
It doesn’t end there. Ms Holmes once told The New Yorker she “doesn’t date” — but at the same time, she was in the middle of a relationship with Theranos’ chief operating officer Sunny Balwani.
And in a previous article, Bilton described how Ms Holmes’ dog, Balto, was named after a famous husky that had led an expedition carrying medicine to fight an outbreak of diphtheria in 1925.
But even that was untrue — the original Balto only completed around 88km of the dangerous trek, taking all the credit and media attention while a different dog completed the entire 420km trip.
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