Sunny Balwani

Unlike CEO Elizabeth Holmes, Balwani was indicted for defrauding patients, as well as investors.

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The jury found him guilty of more counts than the four Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes was convicted of in January. Image without a caption.

In 2009, he became vice chairman of Theranos and later was appointed president and chief operating officer. The pair later struck up a romantic relationship, and continued dating while he was working at the start-up. “What he tells Erika Cheung is that he questions her experience, and he’s sick of people who don’t have enough experience questioning Theranos’s blood testing,” prosecutor Jeff Schenk said in his closing statement. He added that Balwani, an older and more experienced business leader, may not have garnered the same “sympathies” as Holmes, who started working on Theranos when she was a college student. The government also had streamlined its case for this second time around, said Michael Weinstein, chair of the white collar criminal practice at Cole Schotz and a former federal prosecutor. But the house of cards came tumbling down after a Wall Street Journal investigation revealed that Theranos’s technology was not working as well as the company boasted.

He and fraudster Elizabeth Holmes ran the Silicon Valley company as a couple before its implosion.

Their relationship became a romantic one around the time that Holmes was starting Theranos. Holmes was the company's founder and leader. He was also convicted of defrauding patients, something Holmes avoided. Assistant US Attorney Jeffrey Schenk called the message an admission of guilt. Holmes is facing around 20 years in prison and is currently free on bail. "I am responsible for everything at Theranos," he wrote in 2015.

Ramesh Balwani, the former business partner and romantic interest of Elizabeth Holmes, defrauded investors and patients of the blood testing company ...

But prosecutors said he also played a significant role in making critical decisions at the company. Balwani and Holmes were originally charged with fraud together, but a federal judge separated their trials in 2020 after Holmes alleged Balwani had emotionally and sexually abused her. Balwani joined Theranos in 2009 as president and chief operating officer.

The jurors found Balwani guilty on all 12 counts of defrauding both Theranos investors and the patients.

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A jury on Thursday convicted former Theranos executive Ramesh “Sunny” Balwani of collaborating with disgraced Theranos CEO Elizabeth Holmes.

But it turned out that the Edison never worked properly, providing faulty test results that Theranos conducted as part of a deal to set up mini labs in Walgreen’s pharmacies. Balwani’s defense mirrored Holmes’s in one key aspect: Both depicted the pair as tireless workers who believed so deeply in Theranos’ technology that they never sold their respective stakes in the Palo Alto, California, company. In the process, they hoped to discourage the practice of making bold and unproven promises about still-nascent products – a startup strategy known as "fake it until you make it.” Holmes was convicted on four counts of investor fraud and conspiracy earlier this year. The three sat quietly, heads bowed. Such technology could potentially revolutionize healthcare.

Ramesh “Sunny” Balwani, the former president and chief operating officer of healthcare startup Theranos, was found guilty on Thursday of defrauding former ...

Earlier this spring, the Theranos case and Balwani received renewed attention after the premiere of “ The Dropout,” a Hulu original limited series that retold the events surrounding Theranos’ rise and fall. Balwani and Holmes were indicted by a federal grand jury later that year for collaborating to defraud investors and patients. Founded by Holmes in 2003 when she was 19-years-old, Theranos was a healthcare startup focused on creating blood tests that could be performed rapidly with extremely small amounts of blood.

Ramesh “Sunny” Balwani, the former Theranos executive who ran the disgraced blood testing company alongside Elizabeth Holmes, was convicted Thursday of ...

Holmes was charged with 11 counts of wire fraud and conspiracy to commit wire fraud, and in January, she was found guilty on four counts and not guilty on four counts, with the jury deadlocking on a final three charges. During Balwani’s trial, prosecutors showed text messages he sent to Holmes, saying “I am responsible for everything at Theranos. All have been my decisions too.” Unlike Holmes, Balwani did not testify in his trial, but his lawyers argued he sincerely believed in Theranos’ tech, noting he invested millions of dollars of his own money into the company. Holmes and Balwani were charged by federal prosecutors at the same time in 2018, but tried separately.