American business magnate and former President and Chief Operating Officer of Theranos, Ramesh “Sunny” Balwani, was born on June 13, 1965, in Sindh, Pakistan. He was born into an upper-middle-class Hindu Sindhi farming family.
Early life and education
He studied at the prestigious Aitchison College boarding school in Lahore. He stayed there until 1984 and completed schooling that the British colonialists reserved for “young people from good families”. Balwani is trilingual: English, Hindi and Urdu. According to Balwani’s personal lawyer, his family eventually emigrated to India because “life as a Hindu in a predominantly Muslim country like Pakistan was extremely harsh.” They then went to America. Balwani enrolled as an international student at the University of Texas at Austin in the spring of 1987 and joined the Pakistan Student Association. Balwani started working after leaving school and only completed his studies in 1997, when he obtained his bachelor’s degree in information systems. It’s unclear when or why he adopted the nickname “Sunny,” despite the New York Times’ investigation. He used his first name Ramesh in official documents from the late 1990s and in divorce papers from 2002. Since 2012, he has signed documents at Theranos under the name Sunny Balwani.
Career
Balwani worked for Microsoft and Lotus Software in the 1990s. Balwani worked in sales-related roles during his employment at Microsoft. Although he claims to have produced tens of thousands of lines of code, independent research has failed to confirm this, and several Microsoft executives interviewed about him could not name him. While working at Microsoft, he fell in love with Japanese artist Keiko Fujimoto and they married. In late 1999, he began working for CommerceBid.com as president. It was a software development company that helped businesses buy and sell through online auctions on the then-emerging Internet. Commerce One, another popular business development software company, purchased the company in 1999. The entire acquisition was financed with stock, and Balwani joined the new company’s board of directors. Balwani made about $40 million selling his Commerce One shares in July 2000, just before the dot-com bubble burst and the company went bankrupt. He eventually returned to school and earned a master’s degree in business administration from the University of California, Berkeley in 2003. He continued his doctoral program in computer science at Stanford University for four years before quit in 2008. Balwani, who was 37 at the time and enrolled at Berkeley, met Elizabeth Holmes, who was 18 and in her senior year of high school, during their stay. At Stanford, Holmes earned a bachelor’s degree in chemical engineering, but ultimately left the company to focus full-time on Theranos.
Career as COO of Theranos
In 2009, Balwani joined Theranos as president of the company. He oversaw day-to-day operations, but due to Balwani’s actions and the lack of medical professionals on the company’s board of directors, his lack of knowledge in biological sciences or medical equipment became problematic. Former Theranos employees viewed him as domineering, inflexible, and almost paranoid in his fear of corporate espionage. At Theranos, Balwani was known for using jargon that was apparently beyond his understanding in order to appear more competent. In October 2015, The Wall Street Journal published an article alleging that Theranos’ Edison blood testing system provided incorrect diagnoses and medical results. A report released in March 2016 by the federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services confirmed that Edison devices routinely failed quality checks and produced highly inconsistent results.
After a visit to Theranos’ laboratory in Newark, California, CMS sent a warning letter to the company in January 2016. CMS officials proposed a two-year suspension of Balwani’s ability to possess or running a blood lab after the company failed to resolve problems at its California facilities in March 2016. Theranos is also accused of falsely claiming its technology came from the U.S. Department of Health. The defense used it in combat even though it was never actually used. Another exaggeration was the claim that a revenue source worth $100,000 was worth $100 million in 2014. In May 2016, Balwani left his position at Theranos.
About his ex-wife Keiko Fujimoto and her personal life
Balwani was married to Japanese artist Keiko Fujimoto and they lived in San Francisco until their divorce in 2002. While working at Theranos, Balwani was romantically involved with Elizabeth Holmes. They met in 2002, when Holmes was 18 and still in school. He was married at the time and 19 years older than Holmes. Theranos investors were not informed of their relationship. Holmes testified at her trial that she was raped while a student at Stanford and turned to Balwani for support after the attack.
