35 ms·
Google accuses Uber of creating a fake company in order to steal its tech
- Namrog84 9y agoIf this turns out to be true, this does not bold well for a bright UBer future. I feel like I only hear bad things about them lately. Anyone have any speculation as to what might happen to Uber if this turns out to be true?
- charred_toast 9y agoIf it turns out to be a huge case ($$$$$) then I can forsee Google owning part of Uber if not outright.
- EthanHeilman 9y agoGoogle at least at one point owned about 6-7% of the Uber[0]. They may still own that much. [0]: https://www.quora.com/What-percentage-of-Uber-does-Google-own https://www.quora.com/What-percentage-of-Uber-does-Google-ow...
- wand3r 9y agoGoogle will acquire them. They already own shares from a Google venture round
- user5994461 9y agoWho would want to acquire a company like that. They'd have to fire all the employees and management to get rid of the bad seed.
- ceejayoz 9y agoThe customer and driver network is probably substantially more valuable.
- ghostly_s 9y agoHa. Probably 70-80% of both customers and drivers are doing business with Lyft, simultaneously. That's the rub of "contract employees".
- WillPostForFood 9y agoWhy crap on the employees for the lousy behaviour of the execs? You think the average programmer or office manage or designer at Uber is at fault?
- user5994461 9y agoThe exec influence goes down to the employees. Expect most mid managers and the upper hierarchy to be modelled by the top. Then about the bottom employees. Think a minute about what employees are left in that kind of environment and the psychological baggage they might carry.
- WillPostForFood 9y agoThat's silly - it's like saying you guilty of being a citizen of the US under Trump.
- inlined 9y agoAnd about half of us are
- user5994461 9y agoYou don't get to pick your president and you can't change it. However you pick your job and you can leave it anytime you want.
- ardivekar 9y agoTechnically yes. Practically, no.
- __jal 9y agoIt isn't so much about crapping on the employees as recognizing reality. Nobody wants a piece of Uber for the office managers or designers.
- wand3r 9y agoWhy, someone just paid a lot of money to train Uber employees on Google technology
- synaesthesisx 9y agoThey can rebrand it as Goober afterwards though
- giarc 9y agoProblem is they did own part of Uber. They were (are?) invested in Uber.
- hiddencost 9y agoNobody cares about damages; the real meat is whether or not there will be an injunction. Damages could foreseeably go into the $1 billion range; an injunction would cost uber at least an order of magnitude more than that.
- rabidonrails 9y agoTrue, but my understanding is that an injunction in cases like this is very hard to achieve.
- valuearb 9y agoAn injunction against what? Designing and building autonomous cars? An injunction like that might save Uber billions of dollars. I've never bought the idea they needed their own autonomous cars. Someday someone (very likely multiple someones unless our crazy patent system interferes) will build viable autonomous cars and Uber can just buy from them. Their ultimate success will always be based on their brand and how well they provide their service. Until the last 6 months they did an amazing job at both, they had their apps on many times more phones than any competitor, and their app works amazingly well. Now they've tarnished their brand and might be losing market share, well before the market is completely built out. that's what they should be focusing on.
- netsharc 9y agoSome commenter on Reddit/here said that Uber doesn't have a way to profitability, self-driving is just to keep the investor money flowing in. But the future of cars is really like servers, not ownership, but as a service, you'll just use an app to hail a self-driving car to take you anywhere. Whoever can sell their self-driving tech to car manufacturers will win, Uber probably wants to be the infrastructure that the car companies use to manage their CaaS, and if they win the self-driving first-to-market race, they can bundle their existing fleet management service as a bundle with the tech. But if someone else wins the self-driving tech, a car manufacturer can buy that, and either self-develop their own fleet management or buy from someone else (it's a lot simpler than self-driving tech, obviously).
- wand3r 9y agoThis is Ubers fault for leaving themselves open, but this will play out like a hostile takeover w/ Google upping their 6percent stake to controlling or wholly owning Uber
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- joe_the_user 9y agoI assume the biggest motivation for Google is not hurting or controlling Uber but preventing this kind of thing from happening again. I assume there are a lot of people working for Google who are experts in the tech they helped create but no longer owners of that tech. By that token, Google would really try hard to keep this sort of person from leaving with their tech.
- wand3r 9y agoThere are a lot of people at Uber who are experts in Google tech. Why retrain engineers when another company already did it for you-- on a highly complex niche platform
- crench 9y ago"Here's the thing," [Judge William Alsup] said. "You didn't sue him. You sued Uber. So what if it turns out that Uber is totally innocent?" This is going to be a very interesting case.
- jtraffic 9y agoI served jury duty, and the reverse happened. The plaintiffs sued a social worker, but the case revolved around things the Department of Human Services (where he worked) advised him to do, as well as things other members of the organization did independently of him. In that case, I found it easier to decide when the question was "is this one guy responsible for everything that happened?" rather than the more complicated "is DHS as a whole responsible?"
- crench 9y agoThanks for that perspective. I feel like we're constantly looking through the lens of "Uber is doing something shady", so projecting a large scandal onto the company is very easy. The inverse of that being that it could be quite easy for someone, Levandowski in this case, to orchestrate something for himself illegally.
- appetizer 9y agoSounds like a rookie mistake. I always make sure cases are filed against everyone involved, the organizations involved, misspellings of those people and organizations, aliases, etc. I've had county clerks delay proceedings against one defendant simply because the CLERK mispelled the name in the docket. Nope. Let the court remove people from proceedings. Even in a summary judgement I'm not going to collect from uninvolved defendants (although yes many people are not so prudent)
- FireBeyond 9y agoWell, the answer to that, as the Judge knows, in America, for better or worse: "Tough shit for Uber. Shrug."
- awalton 9y ago> So what if it turns out that Uber is totally innocent? I honestly can't see this as an outcome; either Uber's wrong in they completely and miserably failed due dilligence, or they're wrong in that they actively coerced [him] to create a shell company with Google assets so it could "launder" them into Uber. We can't say for certain which it is at this point. All we know is that Uber's trying their level best not to say which by refusing discovery and worming around the issue. That alone signals to me that the preponderance of evidence bar is going to be a fairly easy one for Google to clear here. There's just too many dots that even when left unconnected draw a pretty clear picture of what happened.
- Touche 9y agoThe entire point of Uber is to evade laws on technicalities, so the fact that they are doing this here should be a surprise to no one. That is their core competency, in fact.
- valuearb 9y agoA technicality is they are "regulations" not laws. And probably unconstitutional.
- matt4077 9y agoRegulations are to laws as sort algorithms are to source code, and you should take their constitutionality up the the courts. (The regulations', not the search algorithms'. We all know insertion sort violates the 4th amendment)
- anigbrowl 9y agoWhat does it take to get a business license revoked these days? If an individual carried on the way Uber does s/he's be looking at a long stretch in prison. While I championed Uber's disruption of the taxi monopoly when it got started, and did a lot of free advocacy here on HN against taxi industry shills, the firm has turned out to be as corrupt or worse than the market it set out to disrupt. Should the various allegations made against the firm prove true, and and it seems like there's a good chance of that, a good number of people need to face criminal charges, the company needs to be shut down and its assets auctioned off, and the investors need to end up with nothing because they abrogated their corporate governance responsibilities.
- throwaway2048 9y agoThere's an important personal lesson here, don't mindlessly support stuff that is hyped up.
- gkoberger 9y agoYou can love a product but hate the company that makes it.
- valuearb 9y agoA better lesson is to learn to think critically. Do taxi companies leverage cozy relationships with taxi regulators to restrict competition so they can overcharges customers and increase their profits? The answer to that is almost certainly yes, and provably yes in certain markets. Does that mean every business that is trying to break the taxi monopoly is automatically one of the good guys, and run ethically? The answer to that is almost certainly no.
- anigbrowl 9y agoYou are the only person talking about mindlessly supporting something. I do not regret any of my original support for the firm, which was well-founded based on the information available, and whose existence solved a real problem in the market.
- manmal 9y ago
- Animats 9y agoLevandowski is probably going to come out of this really well. Uber, not so much. Google's LIDAR technology is obsolete spinning-scanner gear, mostly from Velodyne. It's something you'd use on an experimental vehicle, not a production one. The production LIDAR systems are coming, they're all solid state, and they come from big auto parts makers like Delphi and Continental. So by the time the Uber case gets to trial, it will be moot. Levandowski already got his money. Waymo could sue him, but what are the damages? Google isn't selling anything, so they can't show impact on their sales volume. (Neither is Uber. Uber's venture into self-driving is probably more to pump up the valuation than to provide a real service, anyway.) I'm beginning to think that self-driving will be a feature that comes from auto parts companies. You need sensors and actuators, which come from auto parts companies. You need dashboard units, which come from auto parts companies. You need a compute unit, which is just a ruggedized computer packaged for automotive conditions, something that comes from auto parts companies. You need software, which may come from a number of sources. This may not be all that disruptive a technology.
- wolf550e 9y agoThe disruptiveness is measured by the effect, not the effort.
- jbpetersen 9y agoI believe Animats was referring specifically to disruption of industry incumbents and failed to clarify that.
- cmelbye 9y agoApple is an example of why your last paragraph likely isn't true. It's about the end-to-end experience, not the parts that compose it.
- dralley 9y agoI don't know about you, but for the first couple of years at least, my primary concern when buying a self-driving car would be making sure it's advanced enough to not kill me if it hits an ice patch, not the "fluid end-to-end user experience" it offers.
- golfer 9y agoSome quality journalists are live tweeting the proceedings from inside the courtroom. Getting some great updates in real time: https://twitter.com/CSaid https://twitter.com/CSaid https://twitter.com/Priyasideas https://twitter.com/Priyasideas https://twitter.com/inafried https://twitter.com/inafried https://twitter.com/MikeIsaac https://twitter.com/MikeIsaac
- huangc10 9y agoIf this is true, it's kind of a brilliant scheme, you know, in an evil "I'm going to take over the world" sorta way.
- mewwts 9y agoHah, yeah, although they're in court so it's not _that_ brilliant
- marcell 9y agoBased on this live tweets (https://twitter.com/CSaid https://twitter.com/CSaid) it doesn't sound like Waymo/Google is making much headway. They want to pin this on Uber, but haven't presented evidence of wrongdoing by Uber: Judge to Waymo: U have no proof that shows a chain of Levandowski saying to anybody here’s the trade secrets. Unless Waymo presents something like this, I don't see how this trial benefits them. Sure they can make a big fuss an get Levandowski kicked off self driving cars / Lidars, but that won't stop Uber from moving forward with their program.
- Terribledactyl 9y agoA couple of benefits in no particular order: It casts doubt/worry/issues on the legal legitimacy of Uber's tech. Employees/Researchers won't want to become embroiled in this, if they ever want to license the tech I'm sure "what about google?" will come up and need to be mitigated. It gets Alphabet and the newly founded Waymo a lot of "free" publicity, helping to form their public image as a car company. (Wronged by the evil uber) Maybe a little vindictive, but I'm sure their lawyers would rather his compensation burn than be used against them.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- linkregister 9y ago> It casts doubt/worry/issues on the legal legitimacy of Uber's tech. Employees/Researchers won't want to become embroiled in this, if they ever want to license the tech I'm sure "what about google?" will come up and need to be mitigated. Why would an employee ever fear another entity personally suing them? Was there a mass exodus from Google or Samsung after Apple's successful infringement suit in 2012? Why would an employee performing genuinely novel work worry about her work being discredited? I would expect a culpable employee to divest before his organization got caught. Some members of the Enron C-suite sold their stock before the debt hiding scandal broke. Maybe this is happening in Uber's Otto division; has anyone seen anything like this?
- dmitrygr 9y agoJudge Alsup, to Waymo Lawyer: "You have one of the strongest records I've seen of somebody doing something bad. Good for you!"
- Apocryphon 9y agoWhat's the context, what'd the Waymo lawyer do?
- bpicolo 9y agoI assume they mean details of actions the employee took on their computer (putting in flash drive, copying data off, etc)
- valuearb 9y agoWhat allegations do you want to kill it over? Do you need any evidence, or are a few editorials from PandoDaily enough?
- sctb 9y agoWe detached this flagged subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14259900 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14259900.
- anigbrowl 9y agoDon't play that game with me. I qualify my remarks so as not to have to bury my point in restatements of well-known context.
- linkregister 9y agoI think the point that the "game player" is making is that the well-known context isn't universally considered outstanding enough to revoke a business license.
- valuearb 9y agoI'm saying the "well known context" is a bunch of news articles of questionable accuracy. It would be nice to at least have a court trial before killing a company so actual evidence can be offered. And also you should establish the reasons to kill a company. Should a company die if some of its engineers sexually harasses other employees? What if it's HR department mishandles complaints by the victims? Should a company die if it attempts to track and eliminate fraud being committed by purposely breaking Apple App store rules? Should a company die if it attempts to outwit regulators trying to entrap it by giving them fake information? If you think a company should be killed, you damn well should be able to clearly elucidate the reasons for it.
- anigbrowl 9y agoIt would be nice to at least have a court trial before killing a company Yes, that is the mechanism we use for determining whether allegations of untoward behavior are true or false. Did I argue for denying or short-circuiting that process anywhere? No. Your argument is circular, equivalent to complaining that someone can't be indicted or sued because their guilt or liability has yet to be proven at trial. I think you understand this very well and that your skepticism is performative, meant to impress others rather than convince me. Good luck with that strategy.
- TazeTSchnitzel 9y agoThis made me wonder what HN thought of the acquisition at the time. Well: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12315205 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12315205 Top comment noted how the company looked like a “quick flip”.
- bobbles 9y agoThis is amazing - especially reading the thread following as almost all these discussions have been going on again in recent weeks.
- bonzini 9y agoAnd then it diverted to a discussion about a bbq that was held in 2002: https://web.archive.org/web/20150709120858/http://ot.to/ https://web.archive.org/web/20150709120858/http://ot.to/ I think this is the place: https://www.google.com/maps/@41.3678268,-73.7132536,3a,75y,115.45h,82.63t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1s9yOLxD7rg4Xx8fdc4bmQ1A!2e0!7i13312!8i6656 https://www.google.com/maps/@41.3678268,-73.7132536,3a,75y,1... :)
- kristianc 9y agoOriginal HN discussion from the time - several on here, including myself thought acquisition looked like quick flip from the outset: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12315205 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12315205
- fujipadam 9y agoConsidering Uber's past unethical behavior, I am sure they stole tech. The problem is that it is very difficult to prove it. If it is proved, there should be actual consequence to the executives, including jail
- askvictor 9y agoUber seems to be the logical extreme of 'easier to beg forgiveness' mentality; there are no rules (explicit or implicit) or ethical boundaries that are not subject to be broken in pursuit of their goals.
- Consultant32452 9y agoI dunno man, I think Uber is just in the HN wheelhouse and has been stealing our focus lately. Wells Fargo illegally signed people up for countless credit lines they didn't ask for. HSBC got a slap on the wrist for laundering billions in drug money. People in power routinely break the rules and there's basically no penalty.
- pteredactyl 9y agoAmen. Not until Executives are criminally liable will there be any change to this disgusting behavior.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- NovaX 9y agoGoogle actively assisted in selling illegal pharmaceuticals due to the lucrative ad revenue. It was coordinated and driven by the chief executives.
- Consultant32452 9y agoI would put this in the same category as Uber breaking the taxi regulations. In short, I welcome it. I find the current system of requiring prescriptions for so many drugs to be morally repugnant. I support anyone who wants to break those laws, even if they're doing it for completely selfish reasons.
- muro 9y agoI haven't followed it, but weren't they the same pharmaceuticals (aka not fake, same manufacturer, just cheaper), from across the border?
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- asafira 9y agoSince parts of this are public information, when is the next bit of information expected to come out?
- aaron695 9y ago"Google just accused Uber of creating a fake, shell company with its former engineer to steal its tech" They don't seem to be backing that clickbait title do they? I think the backdated form makes sense, more sense they doing something obvious like creating a fake company the 'day' after someone leaves Google.
- PascLeRasc 9y agoIs this Otto the same as www.ottomotors.com? That site seems slightly fake, like the kind of site Hooli in Silicon Valley would have.
- mcpherrinm 9y agoNo, ottomotors.com is a real division of Clearpath: https://www.clearpathrobotics.com/ https://www.clearpathrobotics.com/ I'm assured by somebody who works in assembly line / factory stuff that ottomotors.com has real and good products. Definitely not fake or Hooli.
- tim333 9y agoSo if Uber stole Google's designs but are not using them in their present self driving stuff can Google do much?
- bunderbunder 9y agoThis page loads a 2400x1800 *.jpg into a (on my screen) 372x279 image element. I believe no further comment is necessary.