Billy Evans’ ‘Theranos 2.0’ startup has patents, investors, and a missing CTO—but no product
Source: Fortune ·
As You Can See Everything turns Billy Evans into the year’s most unlikely documentary villain, his Austin startup Haemanthus faces a simple question: What has it built?
From the source
Billy Evans has spent the past week as the breakout character of the year’s most talked-about documentary. Now attention is turning to his day job. Evans, the longtime partner of convicted Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes, runs Haemanthus, an Austin-based startup that says it can use lasers to detect disease in blood, saliva, and urine. Interest in the company has surged since A24 released You Can See Everything, Nathan Fielder and Lance Oppenheim’s documentary about the couple, on Oct. 16. Haemanthus has reportedly raised as much as $20 million and holds at least one granted patent. What it doesn’t have, at least publicly, is a product customers can buy, or published data showing its technology works. It has also lost its chief technology officer. Set aside the “Theranos 2.0” jokes, and a more basic business question remains: What has Haemanthus actually built? Who is Billy Evans? Evans, 34, is a grandson of William and Anne Evans, who founded Evans Hotels in San Diego in 1953. The…