Theranos has been agreeing to a lot of things to keep it afloat lately. Today, the company once known for its one-drop blood testing tech has agreed to pay out $4.65 million in refunds to Arizonans who purchased blood tests between 2013 and 2016.
The company also agreed this week to resolve differences with the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), which had earlier labeled Theranos’ main lab as having “serious deficiencies” and said it was putting patient health and safety in “immediate jeopardy.”
Theranos has also agreed not to operate its own labs for at least two years and has agreed to pay a $30,000 fine as part of that CMS settlement. The regulatory agency, which oversees blood testing labs, has reinstalled Theranos’ lab operating certification as a result.
It was also revealed last month that founder Elizabeth Holmes had agreed to give investors her shares in the company if they promised not to sue. Theranos has found itself in a heap of lawsuits from consumers, former partners and investors after its tangle with faulty test results and government intervention.
This new attempt to play nice and agree to things seems to be an effort to keep the company going. Theranos had to pivot to working on a “miniLab,” which is essentially a lab on a chip in a desktop box, last year, dropping two-thirds of its workforce in the effort. The company also reportedly has just a quarter of its $800 million in funding left and is facing a $140 million lawsuit from former partner Walgreens.
It’s still not clear if the agreement with the CMS will have any influence on other ongoing investigations from the Department of Justice and U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission or if the efforts to appease investors and switch to the new product will be enough to save the company, but Theranos did say in a statement it, “looks forward to working with regulatory authorities to secure approval for these innovative technologies.”