Under-fire Theranos changes unusual board structure to placate critics
Diagnostics service Theranos is to eliminate some high-profile board members that lack medical expertise, such as Henry Kissinger and George P Shultz, shrinking the board from 12 to 5 people. Additionally, the board has issued a statement standing behind both the company and its CEO, Elizabeth Holmes. Theranos has also formed a board dedicated to giving the company medical advice. Theranos has been widely criticised of late, both by the US FDA, journalists and some within the diagnostics community for its secretive practices and lack of transparency over its apparently "revolutionary" process. 

The medical laboratory Theranos, facing skepticism about the accuracy of its tests, is planning to announce that it has reduced the size of its unusual board of directors, eliminating members like Henry A. Kissinger and George P. Shultz.

The board is also planning to issue a statement expressing its support for the company and its leader, Elizabeth Holmes.

“We stand wholeheartedly behind the management, achievements, vision and commitment of this company,” the statement says.

Theranos, a privately held company founded by Ms. Holmes, 31, after she dropped out of Stanford at age 19, has been trying to swat down suspicions that the capability it has promoted — being able to do a wide range of medical tests cheaply and quickly using only a finger prick of blood — is more hype than reality.