Two Indian-Americans sentenced for $1 bn health tech fraud
Updated: Jul 2nd, 2024
Rishi Shah, Shardha Agarwal |
Two Indian-American executives of a Chicago-based health technology startup have been sentenced for their roles in a $1 billion (Rs 8,350 crore) fraud scheme that targeted the company’s clients, lenders, and investors.
Rishi Shah, 38, co-founder and former CEO; Shradha Agarwal, 38, former president; and Brad Purdy, 35, former chief operating officer were convicted of defrauding Outcome Health’s lenders and investors.
Shah was reportedly sentenced to seven-and-a-half years of jail on June 26, while Agarwal was sentenced on June 30 for three years in a halfway house (supervised living arrangement in the US that eases people back into society after incarceration or treatment).
Meanwhile, Purdy was also sentenced on June 30 for two years and three months in jail.
The accused trio was convicted in April 2023.
Shah was convicted of five counts of mail fraud, 10 counts of wire fraud, two counts of bank fraud, and two counts of money laundering, a Department of Justice release said.
While Agarwal was convicted of five counts of mail fraud, eight counts of wire fraud, and two counts of bank fraud, Purdy was convicted on five counts of mail fraud, five counts of wire fraud, two counts of bank fraud, and one count of false statements to a financial institution.
Modus operandi of the fraudulent trio
According to the Department of Justice release, Outcome installed television screens and tablets in doctors’ offices around the US and then sold advertising space on those devices to clients, most of whom were pharmaceutical companies.
According to evidence presented at trial, Shah, Agarwal, and Purdy sold advertising inventory that the company did not have to the clients of Outcome, then under-delivered on its advertising campaigns.
Despite these under-deliveries, the company still invoiced its clients as if it had delivered in full.
The trio lied or caused others to lie to conceal the under-deliveries from clients and make it appear as if the company was delivering advertising content to the number of screens in the clients’ contracts.
Purdy and others at Outcome also inflated metrics that purported to show how frequently patients engaged with the company’s tablets installed in doctors’ offices.
Timeline of the investment fraud
According to the trial evidence, the scheme targeting Outcome’s clients began in 2011, lasted until 2017, and resulted in at least $45 m (₹375.82 cr) of overbilled advertising services.
The under-delivery to Outcome’s advertising clients resulted in a material overstatement of Outcome’s revenue for 2015 and 2016.
The company’s outside auditor signed off on the 2015 and 2016 revenue numbers because Purdy caused others to fabricate data to conceal the under-deliveries from the auditor.
The trio then used the inflated revenue figures in Outcome’s 2015 and 2016 audited financial statements to raise $110 m in debt financing in April 2016, $375 m in debt financing in December 2016, and $487.5 m in equity financing in early 2017.
They lied to investors and lenders to conceal their ongoing under-delivery of advertising campaigns for clients.
Shah and Purdy also misrepresented to investors the efficacy of Outcome’s advertising campaigns by concealing the fact that it had failed to meet return-on-investment commitments to clients.
Massive personal gains in billion dollar fraud
The $110 m debt financing resulted in a $30.2 m dividend to Shah and a $7.5 m dividend to Agarwal; the $487.5 m in equity financing resulted in a $225 m dividend to Shah and Agarwal.
Three other former employees of Outcome pleaded guilty prior to the trial last year.
Ashik Desai, the former chief growth officer, pleaded guilty to one count of wire fraud; Kathryn Choi, a former senior analyst; and Oliver Han, a former analyst, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit wire fraud.
(Compiled from syndicated feed)
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