amounted to what we in the news business call a “nondenial denial.”
“We are disappointed to see that The Wall Street Journal still can’t get
its facts straight,” it began, before going on to admit that the company
had “temporarily” withdrawn its little blood tubes in what it portrayed
as a proactive move to seek FDA clearance for their use.
In the late afternoon, an email went out to all company employees
instructing them to gather in the cafeteria of the Page Mill Road
building for a meeting. Holmes wasn’t her usual well-put-together self.
Her hair was disheveled from her travels and she wore glasses instead
of contact lenses. Standing next to her were Balwani and Heather
King. Striking a defiant tone, she told the assembled staff that the two
articles the Journal had published were filled with falsehoods seeded
by disgruntled former employees and competitors. This sort of thing
was bound to happen when you were working to disrupt a huge
industry with powerful incumbents who wanted to see you fail, she
said. Calling the Journal a “tabloid,” she vowed to take the fight to the
paper.
When she opened the floor to questions, Patrick O’Neill, the former
advertising industry executive who had helped craft her trailblazing
image, was one of the first to raise his hand.
“Do we really want to take on the Wall Street Journal?” he asked,
incredulous.
“Not the Journal, the journalist,” Holmes replied.
After she answered a few more questions, one of the senior
hardware engineers asked Balwani if he would lead them in a chant.
Everyone instantly knew what chant the engineer had in mind. Three
months earlier, when the company had received its herpes test
approval from the FDA, Balwani had exhorted employees to yell “Fuck
you” in unison during a similar meeting in the cafeteria. At the time,
the shouts had been directed at Quest and LabCorp.
Balwani was more than happy to indulge the engineer’s request for
an encore.
“We have a message for Carreyrou,” he said.
At his signal, he and many of the several hundred employees in