Multiple Sports Owners Were Major Backers of Elizabeth Holmes

Multiple sports owners were significant backers of Elizabeth Holmes, the founder of the defunct biotech company Theranos. In the final days of Theranos before Holmes' federal prison sentence, Fielder and Oppenheim documented Holmes for their documentary "You Can See Everything." The company had claimed to have invented a machine capable of performing all blood tests with a single drop of blood, but the Wall Street Journal revealed in 2015 that the company was struggling to produce these tests.

Holmes was ultimately convicted on four counts of fraud in 2022. Among the substantial investors were the Walton family, who had invested $150 million in Theranos pre-collapse and went on to purchase the Denver Broncos in 2022. New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft invested around $1 million, while the DeVos family, which owns the Orlando Magic, put in roughly $100 million.

The Devos family disclosed their significant investment in 2018, just as Betsy DeVos served as the Secretary of Education. Oracle co-founder Larry Ellison, who owns the Indian Wells tennis tournament and has supported Michigan athletics, was also an early investor. Holmes and her husband are now launching a new blood testing company, Haemanthus.