FORTUNE: Its Right to Idolize the Entrepreneurs Striving to Make the World a Better Place

Theranos Elizabeth Holmes may have misguided the public, but real innovators do exist.

Editors: The following post is a response to a Fortune articlethat outlines the dangers of putting founders such as Elizabeth Holmes on a pedestal.

In his article After the Theranos Mess, Can We Finally Quit Idolizing Entrepreneurs?, columnist Steve Tobak argues that our tendency to build up untested innovators only to knock them down when they fail is a harmful distraction.

True, we may be obsessing over entrepreneurial icons at a frantic rate. And yes, some of them will let us down, as happened with Theranos CEO Elizabeth Holmes, who endangered lives with a flawed technology.

But despite the bad actors, there are plenty of entrepreneurs who areactuallycreating innovations at an even more frantic rate. We are living in themostinnovativeperiod in human history, a time whendisruptive technologiesenable entrepreneurs to do what only governments and big research labs could do before: build new industries and solve the grand challenges of humanity.

Witness thetransformationthat computers, networks, sensors, and artificial intelligence are creating and stay tuned for the innovations that synthetic biology, genome sequencing, and nanotechnologies will produce over the next decade. These will transform humanity itself. And it is entrepreneurs all over the world who are leading this charge.

Yes, there are reasons to worry about the dark side of these exponential technologies. The excitement they generate can be abused by entrepreneurs and investors more interested in making money and accumulating accolades than bettering mankind, a situation we saw play out at Theranos. But that doesnt mean we should paint all entrepreneurs with the same brush or fault them all for the mistakes of the few.

And of course we do not need more frauds; these Silicon Valley snake oil hucksters divert critical resources away from genuine entrepreneurs, drain the investing public and can even endanger individuals health.

As Jeff Sonnenfeld and I explained in theWashington Post, when an entrepreneur turns out to be charlatan, the investors and board members who help prop them up must also take responsibility.

Two years ago, I was very hopeful about Theranos. When I first learned Theranos was led by a woman, my heart sang. Could this truly be the breakthrough diagnostic technology that was being touted? Could a woman scientist finally be getting credit for her invention? Throughout history,many greatwomenhave created amazing inventions, and yet they have not received the credit they deserve. Silicon Valleyis well-known boys clubthat too oftenmistreats womenwhile minimizing their contributions. Badly needed are success stories with female protagonists who can change stereotype and serve as a role models. That is what I was hoping Holmes was; its why I told theSan Jose Mercury Newsthat she may be the female Mark Zuckerberg that Silicon Valley has been waiting for. For this, I do not apologize.

I would not hesitate even now to idolize any womanor manwho promises to better the world.I know I may be disappointed again, as I was with Holmes, but we have to giveentrepreneurs thebenefit of the doubt. My belief is that Holmes is an exception, not the rule; that entrepreneurs who set out to solve big problems are motivated by a desire to do goodratherthanthedesire to makeafortune. In Silicon Valley, if you want to make a quick buck, you build an app, you dont attempt to solve a grand challenge.

Yes, the majority startups fail and most crazy ideas are indeed crazy. But every now and then, you get a Tesla, SpaceX, Facebook, or Googlecompanies that defy the odds and create world changing technologies. Their visionary founders are modern day heroesworthy of our admiration.

Link to article on Fortune Magazine’s website

About Author

Vivek Wadhwa is Vice President of Innovation and Research at Singularity University; Fellow, Arthur & Toni Rembe Rock Center for Corporate Governance, Stanford University; Director of Research at the Center for Entrepreneurship and Research Commercialization at the Pratt School of Engineering, Duke University; and distinguished visiting scholar, Halle Institute of Global Learning, Emory University. He is author of ”The Immigrant Exodus: Why America Is Losing the Global Race to Capture Entrepreneurial Talent”–which was named by The Economist as a Book of the Year of 2012. Wadhwa oversees the academic programs at Singularity University, which educates a select group of leaders about the exponentially growing technologies that are soon going to change our world. These advances—in fields such as robotics, A.I., computing, synthetic biology, 3D printing, medicine, and nanomaterials—are making it possible for small teams to do what was once possible only for governments and large corporations to do: solve the grand challenges in education, water, food, shelter, health, and security.

Disclaimer: Please use this channel at your own discretion. These articles are contributed by our users. We are not responsible or liable for any problems related to the utilization of information of these articles.