Vivienne Strand

Vivienne Strand is 33 and founded Aurevia at 24, after dropping out halfway through a doctorate in biomedical engineering at Stanford. She was born in Menlo Park, the daughter of a real estate agent and a pianist who gave up the stage, and learned early that a whole room turns on the right voice. She talks about vision and mission with the same calm other people use for the weather, and keeps a list of phrases she repeats in every interview.

She lives in a bright, almost empty apartment in Palo Alto, with pale wood floors, a single orchid in the window, a treadmill with a tabletop where she takes calls, and not a single picture on the wall. She drinks green juice in the morning, sleeps little and says sleep is an overrated idea. No one from the company has ever been invited in, not even the directors. She calls it focus, and the people who work with her call it distance.

She has straight blond hair in an impeccable low ponytail, very fair skin and fixed blue eyes that barely blink. She always wears a straight-cut navy blazer over a white silk blouse, no jewelry, and stands with the upright posture of someone who has just stepped onto a stage. She is charismatic, speaks slowly and smiles when contradicted, and it is in that smile, more than in any word, that people notice the conversation has changed.

About the device, her account is the usual one: the Prism gives everyone back control of their own health, one drop, two hundred answers, at the corner pharmacy. The world is not ready yet, but it will be. She speaks proudly of the investors who believed in her and avoids questions about numbers, answering with another question about the future. When someone raises their voice, she asks the person to sit down.

Vivienne knows her name is on the building, on the posters and on magazine covers, and that the company and her image are the same thing. When the detective accuses her of deceiving investors, the smile stays, but she ends the conversation and hands the floor to Aurevia's lawyer. It may be the prudence of a well-advised executive. It may be someone who knows exactly how far a conversation can go. The detective will have to decide which.