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Uber’s Anthony Levandowski out as Advanced Technologies lead amid legal fight

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Re: Uber’s Anthony Levandowski out as Advanced Technologies lead amid legal fight

#21

Post by CalChris »

sriram_sun wrote: post #17
CalChris wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That and Uber pissed off the wrong people by stealing Levandowski after Google had bought his company. And that after Google had invested in Uber.

No Levandowski pissed off the wrong people by stealing core technology from Google. Stealing employees is OK. Technology is not. It is the law.

Yes, that is what I meant. The stealing of trade secrets (illegal) was on top of the stealing of employees (legal) which was on top of the investment (speculation). But add it all up and Google is going to make an example out of Uber.

Re: Uber’s Anthony Levandowski out as Advanced Technologies lead amid legal fight

#22

Post by kyrra »

sriram_sun wrote: post #17
CalChris wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That and Uber pissed off the wrong people by stealing Levandowski after Google had bought his company. And that after Google had invested in Uber.

No Levandowski pissed off the wrong people by stealing core technology from Google. Stealing employees is OK. Technology is not. It is the law.

https://techcrunch.com/2017/03/29/waymo-pursued-arbitration-...

Re: Uber’s Anthony Levandowski out as Advanced Technologies lead amid legal fight

#23

Post by jacquesm »

sriram_sun wrote: post #16
ChuckMcM wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That would be hilarious (the Patentshield application). It is also rare to have one of these disputes happening with such wide visibility. And reading the coverage so far it sounds like Levandowski chose to interpret the meaning of his employment agreement with Google much more charitably than Google does (which is somewhat expected on Google's part). I went back and looked at mine from 2006 (which was the year earli…

Consider Google's investment in Uber! "The $258 million is an 86 percent chunk of Google Ventures’ $300 million dollar a year fund, and it’s unclear whether the firm will continue to make such sizable investments." - https://techcrunch.com/2013/08/22/google-ventures-puts-258m-...

Uber could really play that to their advantage: "Your Honor, Google is just trying to soften us up because they don't get their way in the boardroom..."

Having two roles in a lawsuit is a very dangerous thing, no matter how much their ex employee is at fault here they could easily make a lot of smoke out of that.

Re: Uber’s Anthony Levandowski out as Advanced Technologies lead amid legal fight

#24

Post by jacquesm »

atomical wrote: post #14
arkitaip wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe Uber has realized that this guy is toxic and can't be trusted handling "their" tech? If he spent a decade stealing Google's tech, are they willing to risk him treating Uber the same way? Especially since Uber's epic level of sliminess would make it even easier for Levandowski to rationalize theft.

Maybe Google should hire him back.

Why on earth would they ever do that? Why would anybody hire him? He may be good but he's also damaged goods with a serious trust issue attached to his name. Hire me and you'll get sued by the largest tech companies on the planet is not a really good opener for a job interview.

Re: Uber’s Anthony Levandowski out as Advanced Technologies lead amid legal fight

#25

Post by dragonwriter »

ChuckMcM wrote: post #19
geofft wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't this a civil case, i.e., nobody is charging either Levandowski or Uber with a crime? And isn't Uber a) not a court of law, and therefore not obligated to presume innocence, and b) an at-will employer, who can terminate Levandowski merely for making life hard for them, whether or not he was responsible?

Yes it is a civil case, and it is a valid point about the lack of a criminal complaint. My explanation is inadequate. The burden of proof in a theft of trade secrets argument is on the plaintiff[1,2]. Google needs to prove Levandowski stole trade secrets, it does not require Uber to prove that he didn't. I am also presuming that Uber has an employment contract with Levandowski which includes earn outs as part of the…

> The burden of proof in a theft of trade secrets argument is on the plaintiff

Yes, but it's a "preponderance of the evidence" burden which means a literally any evidence for each of the required elements can meet it, if not countered by stronger evidence on the other side. "Proof" in law doesn't mean the same as in mathematics. (And in civil law, not even what it means in criminal law.)

Re: Uber’s Anthony Levandowski out as Advanced Technologies lead amid legal fight

#26

Post by jacquesm »

glangdale wrote: post #5

Can this conceivably make a difference at this late stage? Genuinely curious. Surely if a judge accepts the theory that Levandowski helped Uber's program along with stolen IP, having him 'no longer working on the program' at this stage would have to look like window dressing. Doesn't it just make them look worse, like they are admitting that there's a problem?

It just might tip the balance to not having the program shut down, which is what the injunction is asking for. So by not waiting until a verdict but to pre-emptively remove him they hope that enough of this sticks to Levandowski that does not directly stick to Uber that they will be allowed to continue the program. It's a hail Mary pass at best.

Re: Uber’s Anthony Levandowski out as Advanced Technologies lead amid legal fight

#27

Post by user5994461 »

CalChris wrote: post #21
sriram_sun wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No Levandowski pissed off the wrong people by stealing core technology from Google. Stealing employees is OK. Technology is not. It is the law.

Yes, that is what I meant. The stealing of trade secrets (illegal) was on top of the stealing of employees (legal) which was on top of the investment (speculation). But add it all up and Google is going to make an example out of Uber.

And it's twice as impactful because it's happening simultaneously with other disastrous events and sexual harassment lawsuits. News love big names with big drama.

Re: Uber’s Anthony Levandowski out as Advanced Technologies lead amid legal fight

#28

Post by zaphar »

ChuckMcM wrote: post #6
jacquesm wrote: post #2

That's just Uber trying avoid having their self-driving car department shut-down. But it could definitely still happen. Maybe Uber should apply to Google's 'PatentShield' program ;)

That would be hilarious (the Patentshield application). It is also rare to have one of these disputes happening with such wide visibility. And reading the coverage so far it sounds like Levandowski chose to interpret the meaning of his employment agreement with Google much more charitably than Google does (which is somewhat expected on Google's part). I went back and looked at mine from 2006 (which was the year earli…

It's all the more interesting because Google makes it ridiculously easy to ask for that permission and get a legally unambiguous go or no go for any side projects. It's not like this would have been murky waters.

Re: Uber’s Anthony Levandowski out as Advanced Technologies lead amid legal fight

#29

Post by jacquesm »

zaphar wrote: post #28
ChuckMcM wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That would be hilarious (the Patentshield application). It is also rare to have one of these disputes happening with such wide visibility. And reading the coverage so far it sounds like Levandowski chose to interpret the meaning of his employment agreement with Google much more charitably than Google does (which is somewhat expected on Google's part). I went back and looked at mine from 2006 (which was the year earli…

It's all the more interesting because Google makes it ridiculously easy to ask for that permission and get a legally unambiguous go or no go for any side projects. It's not like this would have been murky waters.

And it's also fairly clear that this would have been a 'no'.

Re: Uber’s Anthony Levandowski out as Advanced Technologies lead amid legal fight

#30

Post by dragonwriter »

glangdale wrote: post #5

Can this conceivably make a difference at this late stage? Genuinely curious. Surely if a judge accepts the theory that Levandowski helped Uber's program along with stolen IP, having him 'no longer working on the program' at this stage would have to look like window dressing. Doesn't it just make them look worse, like they are admitting that there's a problem?

> Can this conceivably make a difference at this late stage?

If they are working on alternative technology not under legal cloud in case thet lose the Waymo battle in a way which doesn't block all future work, yes, having Levandowski's​ hands off of it makes a huge difference.

It probably makes no difference in the Waymo fight, though.

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