Waymo vs Uber: The Theft of Intellectual Property

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Waymo (Self-driving car subsidiary of Alphabet, Inc.) sued Uber for allegedly stealing trade secrets. According to them, Anthony Levandowski had stored files containing data on Google’s research on self-driving cars (the project was later moved to Waymo) on his personal laptop while still working there (Henning, 2019). This data constituted a trade secret, which financially benefits Uber while harming Waymo (Henning, 2019). Allegedly, Uber used this research in its self-driving car project without paying a license fee, thus depriving the tech company of its profit from the research (Porter, 2019). An independent expert has confirmed that Uber’s current technology can be based on the data that constitutes Waymo’s trade secret (Porter, 2019). At the core of this issue is Levandowski’s transferal of data and whether it constitutes the theft of intellectual property.

Intellectual property and trade secret laws exist to encourage and protect competition. Thanks to them, an individual innovator or company can benefit from novel technology and thus compete with established actors in the field. This prevents major players from establishing a monopoly by acquiring such technology. By relying on intellectual property and trade secret laws, an entity can defend its innovation from being used in such a manner. Competition needs to be protected because it promotes innovation and general better practices, which benefits the vast majority.

Although the initial lawsuit between Uber and Waymo was settled, disputes about the use of the contested technology are still ongoing. As part of the settlement, both companies agreed to employ an independent technical expert to ensure no Waymo technology is incorporated in Uber’s hardware and software (Korosec, 2019; Lee, 2019). This expert, according to Uber, has “made adverse findings as to certain functions in [their] autonomous vehicle software” (Lee, 2019). As a result of these findings, the company is likely to be forced to pay a licensing fee to Waymo or implement significant design changes (Porter, 2019). The latter option, as explained by Uber, would likely take a significant amount of time and resources, and is, therefore, less likely than simply licensing the technology in question (Porter, 2019). Considering the difficulty of developing and adjusting innovative technology like that involved in self-driving cars’ hardware and software, the benefits of this decision are likely to outweigh its drawbacks. Furthermore the rate of development of this segment of technology, it is probable that the specific solutions that are being contested are likely to be obsolete within a decade, thus making the licensing fee redundant.