Another Group of Google Veterans Starts a Self-Driving Technology Company

Post by Qworg » Thu, May 04, 2017, 11:46 PM UTC

malandrew wrote: post #31

malandrew wrote: post #9

When companies pay each engineer X and earn 10 times X on each engineer, this is inevitable. Near as I can tell, this is a strategy that is helping engineers retain more of the value they are creating. If the difference was more subtle such as 2 to 3 times X, then the incentive to go through this much trouble to retain much of the value you create is much smaller.

In light of this observation, Google's current lawsuit could be viewed as an attempt to deter employee defection by signaling liabilities for potential acquirers, which will suppress the valuation of any acquisition. Google was already at the center of the high-tech employee wage-fixing earlier this decade, so filing lawsuits to create deterrence wouldn't be that surprising. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-Tech_Em…

Post by gallerdude » Fri, May 05, 2017, 12:10 AM UTC

malandrew wrote: post #35

gallerdude wrote: post #27

This kind of articulates a larger attitude I feel about startups in general - too many people are going for too much. Right now, a bunch of companies are going for too much of the metaphorical self-driving pie. But, there's a lot of niches with less competition - yeah, the slice might be smaller, but I'd rather have a 90% chance at 10% of the pie than a 10% chance at 90% of the pie.

What niches do you consider unexploited or lacking in competition?

Post by sbov » Fri, May 05, 2017, 12:44 AM UTC

ben_jones wrote: post #7

deepnotderp wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What exactly is the downside of that? Is it really that wrong that bright employees who make the actual product have a little more leverage?

I see parallels between this and lobbying in the US government where lobbied officials will leave for a private sector position as a lobbyist or executive at say a $BIG_TELCO or $BIG_OIL company. Why shouldn't government professionals use their knowledge and expertise to get more leverage going into the private sector? I think the biggest argument here is that sometimes the end goal becomes not the work that person i…

Post by jpatokal » Fri, May 05, 2017, 1:05 AM UTC

SEJeff wrote: post #29

Am I the only person genuinely shocked Google doesn't slap their self driving car engineers with non-competes? I realize that non-competes are illegal by CA law, but perhaps they should do the engineering in a different state to stop hemorrhaging talent that tries to compete with them?

Post by autokad » Fri, May 05, 2017, 3:30 AM UTC

Qworg wrote: post #51

malandrew wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In light of this observation, Google's current lawsuit could be viewed as an attempt to deter employee defection by signaling liabilities for potential acquirers, which will suppress the valuation of any acquisition. Google was already at the center of the high-tech employee wage-fixing earlier this decade, so filing lawsuits to create deterrence wouldn't be that surprising. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-Tech_Em…

Or the lawsuit could be viewed as an attempt to deter industrial espionage by a competitor within a hot field. Between these, which do you think is more likely?