Fallen US biotech star Elizabeth Holmes was convicted on Monday of defrauding investors in her blood-testing startup Theranos, in a high-profile case seen as an indictment of Silicon Valley culture.

Jurors found Holmes guilty of tricking investors into pouring money into what she said was a revolutionary testing system, but also acquitted her on some charges, and failed to agree on others.

The 37-year-old now faces the possibility of years behind bars, in a case that put on trial the line between startup hustle and criminal dishonesty.

Holmes had vowed to revolutionize diagnostics with self-service machines that could run an array of tests on just drops of blood, a vision that drew high-profile backers and made her a billionaire by the age of 30.