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Holmes, 37, was found guilty of a sophisticated scam that duped investors and patients into backing radical finger-prick blood testing technology which could be used in supermarkets – but which never worked.

A San Jose, California, jury convicted her of four counts of fraud after a three-month trial.

Holmes, who faced 11 charges, was found not guilty of four, with jurors deadlocked on three.

The university drop-out founded Theranos – a hybrid of therapy and diagnosis – when she was 19.

By 2015 the company was valued at £6.6billion and she was declared the world’s youngest self-made female billionaire.

Holmes said she had created a less painful, convenient and cheaper way to scan for hundreds of diseases and other health problems from a few drops of blood.

Mini-labs would be set up in Walgreens chemists and Safeway shops across the US that would use a small Theranos testing device called the Edison.

Holmes modelled herself on Bill Gates and Steve Jobs, and her concept won widespread acclaim from experts including Harvard University and at Time magazine.

Her glitzy presentations also enthralled wealthy investors and helped Theranos raise more than £664million, including from software magnate Larry Ellison. But a month after Theranos’s $9billion valuation, the Wall Street Journal published a story that claimed the firm’s technology was so flawed it was using equipment made by other firms.

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In 2018, after an investigation by medical and financial regulators, criminal charges were filed against Holmes and her former lover Ramesh Balwani, the president of Theranos, accusing them of fraud. Holmes’s defence lawyers argued she was emotionally and sexually abused by Mr Balwani. He denies all allegations and stands trial next month.

Holmes – who had her first child, a boy in July – left court on bond, with her husband Billy Evans and her parents.

She will be sentenced later.

Jennifer Lawrence will portray her fall in a film called Bad Blood, while Amanda Seyfried will play Holmes in a TV mini-series.

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