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Otonomo, with nearly $55M in funding, is cloning our product

smartcar.com

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Re: Otonomo, with nearly $55M in funding, is cloning our product

#331

Post by ben509 »

doodpants wrote: post #279
joeax wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is pretty egregious, but in reality the only thing that was copied was the docs for the API, not the API itself. The other company still has the write all the backend code, and given their track record of just ripping stuff off, may not have the engineering chops to pull it off. In addition, as Smartcar continuously improves their product and API, the other company can only react to these changes. If I was the O…

The actual saying is "imitation is the sincerest form of flattery". Sorry, but it's a pet peeve of mine when people replace "sincerest" with "best", because it changes the point of the adage.

Because sincerity implies the flattery is entirely genuine, rather than best suggesting it is heaping praise upon you? Hadn't thought of that; it's a good distinction to make.

Re: Otonomo, with nearly $55M in funding, is cloning our product

#332

Post by jimbokun »

whoisjuan wrote: post #198
keithwhor wrote: post #114

Smartcar has raised $12M in financing from A16Z and NEA. The difference between $12M and $55M is a single financing stage. What likely happened here is a remote team was paid to generate docs with a directive like, “Smartcar has a good API,” and stole them directly. Then the management team didn’t bother checking. This is great PR for Smartcar all things considered, and I actually think has a fantastic silver lining:…

> What likely happened here is a remote team was paid to generate docs with a directive like, “Smartcar has a good API,” and stole them directly. They didn't steal the docs (not only the docs). They stole the whole public facing architecture as evidenced by the fact that they are using in some instances the exact same API resources names and method names.

And randomly generated UUIDs from code examples.

Re: Otonomo, with nearly $55M in funding, is cloning our product

#333

Post by wbl »

lapnitnelav wrote: post #83
jacquesm wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> German VC firm that was, as I recall, very upfront about this https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rocket_Internet

Ah good old Rocket Internet. Used to deal quite a lot with them back in the days. For all the ethically ambiguous things they do, I still remember fondly their creative ways of using AdTech.

There is nothing wrong with competition. Read Smith.

Re: Otonomo, with nearly $55M in funding, is cloning our product

#334

Post by Lucadg »

ChuckMcM wrote: post #44

That is pretty egregious, and its also par for the course. And that is why startup companies go through all the hoops of being "stealth" and having NDAs and what not. There was a German VC firm that was, as I recall, very upfront about this. Clone a successful US company before it got to the European market. On the one hand it is great to have validation of the idea, on the other its a pain to have someone with more…

Rocket Internet: they copied Airbnb with Wimdu and wasted 90 M in the process.

Re: Otonomo, with nearly $55M in funding, is cloning our product

#335

Post by jacquesm »

matz1 wrote: post #247
jacquesm wrote: post #235

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That was about as unwinnable as they come. So no, that wasn't the wrong lawyer, that was simply the wrong client. https://webwereld.nl/overheid/10591-webcamsites-bevechten-el... (Dutch)

No case are unwinnable. At least not with that attitude. Look at the O.J. Simpson case for example.

He lost the civil suit. And the only reason you bring it up is because it is exceptional. The general rule is that the courts tend to get it right but there are obvious (and glaring) exceptions.

The quality of your lawyer will help in the gray areas, and may get you a reduced sentence in case of a criminal affair but in general you will lose if you go to court with a case where you were in the wrong. It's not a perfect system but for most cases it works out.

Re: Otonomo, with nearly $55M in funding, is cloning our product

#336

Post by kevinguh »

joeax wrote: post #100
ChuckMcM wrote: post #44

That is pretty egregious, and its also par for the course. And that is why startup companies go through all the hoops of being "stealth" and having NDAs and what not. There was a German VC firm that was, as I recall, very upfront about this. Clone a successful US company before it got to the European market. On the one hand it is great to have validation of the idea, on the other its a pain to have someone with more…

This is pretty egregious, but in reality the only thing that was copied was the docs for the API, not the API itself. The other company still has the write all the backend code, and given their track record of just ripping stuff off, may not have the engineering chops to pull it off. In addition, as Smartcar continuously improves their product and API, the other company can only react to these changes. If I was the O…

Given the current ruling in Oracle v. Google, though, I'd imagine Smartcar would have grounds for a legal case. If Oracle is awarded damages from Google for "copying" the Java API specification in Android, even with a different underlying implementation, then I'd imagine Smartcar can highlight the similarities to their own dispute with Otonomo. The tricky thing is it looks like Otonomo is an Israeli company so I'm not familiar with how US court rulings apply across international boundaries -- perhaps at the very least Smartcar can attain an injunction against Otonomo within the US.

Re: Otonomo, with nearly $55M in funding, is cloning our product

#337

Post by lars_francke »

dawnerd wrote: post #94
tijs wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The documentation only has a screenshot of the brands supported. Would be nice to just be able to lookup my car brand and make support in the docs instead of having to make an Auth flow first...

Yeah... I went to their homepage and still had no idea what cars they supported, what features the car needed, etc. From my understanding though they're just a wrapper API around the car manufactures existing apis?

Agreed. The homepage is confusing and doesn't give me some of the information I need.

The requirements/supported brands & models should be somewhere prominent on the front page, and I'm honestly still confused. Similar any country restrictions. This being limited to the US should not be hidden three levels deep in some FAQ.

The Otonomo isn't any better though, it doesn't even seem to have any links to the docs.

Re: Otonomo, with nearly $55M in funding, is cloning our product

#338

Post by cobbzilla »

jforman wrote: post #138
yingw787 wrote: post #34

Holy crap. The only way forward for Bessemer et al. VCs is to immediately withdraw their funding for this “company” and cut all ties in order to prove that they had no forewarning that this is how their money was being used. There are so few actors this visibly bad that if they didn’t do anything they would become “that guy” everybody avoids, in both the deals and funding space, when orgs do their due diligence. So t…

There is no such thing as "withdrawing funding" in this context. The Series A is long closed and Bessemer is deeply entwined with the company's governance. The most severe move they could take would be to enforce whatever contractual mechanisms they have to block additional financing pending an independent investigation and replacement of responsible parties. Or they could directly force the matter if investors hold…

If the investors have a board and shareholder majority (which they may not), and really thought this was a terrible investment decision that they want to get out of, then they could vote to wind down the company immediately, redistributing the assets pro-rata (with possible liquidation preferences). This would be roughly the same as "withdrawing funding".

They could recoup a huge part of their investment before things get worse. But again, afaik this requires a shareholder majority, barring any strings/triggers on the investment terms that could be activated.

Re: Otonomo, with nearly $55M in funding, is cloning our product

#339

Post by jerf »

janoc wrote: post #327
jerf wrote: post #304

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't particularly agree with you; I've often thought that amounts to trying to win the debate by nuking the entire playing field. Even if you win, have you? But I can spot you that anyhow, because there's a perfectly reasonable fallback position: This is illegal . It's a copyright infringement at the very least, and possibly other things as well. And being "illegal", the "what are you gonna do about it" actually h…

Copying a design is not illegal . Unless the design is patented (which it doesn't seem to be or the OP would likely have said so in the article), everyone is free to copy any design they want. That you wish something was true doesn't make it so, unfortunately. What is not OK is copying the documentation verbatim, that is copyrighted. However, that is, frankly, the least of the problems (and easiest to rectify) when s…

So, I'm wrong about this act being illegal, because it's not illegal, except for the parts where it is illegal?

Re: Otonomo, with nearly $55M in funding, is cloning our product

#340

Post by jerf »

matz1 wrote: post #330
jerf wrote: post #304

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't particularly agree with you; I've often thought that amounts to trying to win the debate by nuking the entire playing field. Even if you win, have you? But I can spot you that anyhow, because there's a perfectly reasonable fallback position: This is illegal . It's a copyright infringement at the very least, and possibly other things as well. And being "illegal", the "what are you gonna do about it" actually h…

even if its illegal, its nothing unless you win it in court.

I think I mentioned that when I said "moving straight to legal action".
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