I don't think we can really make any informed remarks on these claims without more information. We don't know: * the NDA terms * what the "trade secrets" Goo

I don't think we can really make any informed remarks on these claims without more information. We don't know: * the NDA terms * what the "trade secrets" Google is alleged to have taken/used are * whether the patents are going to stand under scrutiny * why they couldn't come to an agreement in the first place. If I were in Google's position, I would probably have either paid them even a minorly extortionate value to come to a licensing agreement (to mitigate precisely this circumstance), or arranged a "clean room" to implement their Loon tech without anyone involved in the trade secrets having input (beyond the necessary "approve/disapprove" from some level of management above the team, since they allege the co-founders were covered by the NDA and knew trade secrets). It's not impossible that Google is acting in poor faith here, but I don't think we can draw any conclusions until more information comes out.