Who is Anthony Levandowski, and why is Google suing him?
theguardian.com
theguardian.com
Clearly the guy did not realize that Google spends inordinate amount of resources watching their own employees. When I was there, a couple of laptops were stolen from HQ and the amount, and detail, of the laptops they had (location beacons, video footage from dozens of cameras, and RAT like tools on the laptops themselves) let them capture the crooks, recover the laptops, and identify the contractor who had assisted in access to the building in something like a few hours after they were reported stolen. I was really impressed by that, it certainly let anyone who was thinking about it know just how silly it would be to try to do something counter to the company's interests.
But this comment, "At Google, Levandowski said, he was always chafing at the slow pace of progress. He finally left the company in January 2016, a month after Waymo alleges he had downloaded the technical files, and within days had formed a new company, 280 Systems, which Waymo claims became Otto." I find perhaps the most interesting. I can say a lot of things about Google but 'slow' is not something that generally came to mind. So that is surprising.
And then there is what this guy put at risk, there is this comment: "After covering his tracks, the lawsuit alleges, Levandowski pocketed a multimillion-dollar payout from Google and, using the secrets he had just stolen, promptly set up a new company, Otto, which was acquired shortly after by Uber for around $680m."
Presumably, as part of the acquisition he was signing that he wasn't infringing on any previous agreements by joining and that he had rights to the material in question. And so if this goes against him, it seems Google will have cause to get back their payouts, and Uber will have cause to get back the $680M they paid too. And perhaps a huge chunk of that will come out of his own net worth. Maybe he squirreled away a bunch of cash that he thinks is out of reach of the IRS/Courts but really?
Going to be interesting indeed.
Perhaps Google's preference for not having their autonomous vehicles driving under trucks or running around San Francisco recklessly chafed at him.
Regardless of the wrong Levandowski may have committed, he is still an extremely talented engineer in a field where a 'space race' of sorts is going on between a handful of heavily monied-up players.
On one hand, I think Waymo has ability to financial ruin Levandowski. On the other hand, no matter how tainted he is by this scandal, there are still 10 other players in this field who would be willing to pay him a huge salary. So he could easily get a multi-million dollar salary from someone else.
I suppose what could happen is that other companies would be unwilling to work with Levandowski because if a new employer of Levandowski's happens to develop technology similar to Waymo's, Waymo could sue the new company and say the new company received Waymo's proprietary information from Levandowski. Even if that didn't happened, Levandowskis presence is enough to prove otherwise. In other words, just the presence of Levandowski in another self-driving car project is huge legal liability. And that may be his downfall.
It is, however, sad to think that this technology could be set back a few years because of Levandowski's actions.
If he loses, I don't think he will be as easily re-employable as you do. Sure he is clearly a talented engineer but he will be on the record as having cost two companies in this space millions of dollars, primarily due to his own actions. I don't know of any hiring manager who will sign off on that level of risk to the company.
Oddly, if he wins, I think it will result in still greater restrictions, surveillance, and lock downs on employees at Google so in some way it may effect way more people than just the self driving car crowd.
That said, I think the risk of setting the technology back will be Google aggressively pursuing infringement claims against anyone trying to develop self driving cars in an effort to 'not lose' the investment they made. Worst case scenario is a 'digital cash' type disaster[1] but even just suppressing a lot of research will be an impact. Again, if Google wins there will be a lot concern about hiring ex-Google engineers fearing taint.
[1] David Chaum developed some early digital cash patents and aggressively sued anyone trying to develop micropayments or e-cash in the late '90s while simultaneous producing no useful technology of his own, pushing out the possibility of useful e-cash until as least 2018.
I am less concerned about one piece of technology and more concerned about the future of employer relations in general. Employers will become increasingly suspicious of employees leaving and will take actions to either prevent this or to stifle the actual knowledge gained to be used elsewhere.
Seems unlikely if his work is the poisoned fruit of IP theft as Google claims
Firstly there appears to be public evidence of stealing from the employer and any hiring company would wonder if it would be the next target. Secondly, just by having him work on your tech, you might get exposed to lawsuits from Google.
No HR and Legal department would sign off on a such a hiring decision.
1) Google has Android because they did something very similar to Apple: Eric Schmidt was on Apple's board and used his inside info to drive smartphone development at Google. A massive lawsuit then transpired, but for Google on balance it was worth it to steal the Android IP from Apple.
http://9to5mac.com/2011/10/20/steve-jobs-im-going-to-destroy...
2) For that matter, David Drummond was on the board of Uber and arguably took info from there to Google as well, using it to start their ride hailing project. Uber did not sue at that time.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-02-02/exclusive...
3) Google was very slow on self-driving. Levandowski and others tried to get Google to ship a real self-driving car product for years, but only Uber actually had the cojones to do it in Pittsburgh and Arizona. That is what finally lit a fire under Google to spin out Waymo.
My point is that I understand it is a very competitive and "when they do it, it's bad, when I do it, it's strategy" kind of world. And I completely understand why Levandowski might just say (note he didn't, I just can imagine that he might) "Screw them I'm the one making this happen, I deserve all this money and it is my data, I created it or caused it to be created."[5]
Google already paid huuge sums of money to these engineers[6]. And they have been unable to make any money here or nearly as much progress as others. So one wonders if this is actually an 'Overture' maneuver[7]. Where they agree to settle for 10% of Uber's stock which they will sell all of at the IPO. Netting back their investment in self driving, and a nice bonus. Then they dump the whole thing on Fiat Chrysler and move along.
These things are fun to watch, they don't often happen quite so visibly.
[1] http://www.zdnet.com/article/microsoft-is-making-2bn-a-year-...
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Drummond_(Google)
[3] http://www.businessinsider.com/google-plan-to-beat-microsoft...
[4] WARNING - autoplaying video https://www.cnet.com/news/microsoft-sues-over-google-hire/
[5] The three conditions of the fraud triangle, opportunity, pressure, and rationalization -- http://www.hrzone.com/hr-glossary/what-is-the-fraud-triangle
[6] http://www.theverge.com/2017/2/13/14599186/google-waymo-self...
[7] http://www.nytimes.com/2004/08/10/business/technology-google...
This is totally false
> “I thought you could just do it yourself,” he said. “Then I found out that there is a team dedicated to that, a process. Got a little bit in trouble for doing it.”
Wow. What world is this guy living in, where he thought he should personally hire a lobbyist to change some laws to make his job easier? Maybe it's the difference between me and a 10x-er, but I just don't understand this.
> A: They have this feeling that rules don’t apply to them, although that mind-set is often the key to much of their success. If they’re told something can’t be done a certain way, they think that doesn’t apply to them and find a way around it.
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/19/your-money/inside-the-min...
I think this George Bernard Shaw quote pretty much explains the guy.
Is he naive or is Google overreaching? Going to be interesting watching this one play out.
I suspect, access of "14,000 highly confidential and proprietary files shortly before his resignation" will play a major role in swaying the deciders. Experience tells us that not all of those 14k were critical, what if it had be 1 or 2 critical design docs? In a different or future case, we may see that happen. Corps have incentive to reduce competitors, but now may start recognizing the potential leverage they have - "Our network logs show Joe accessed our main design doc 1 week before he left for company doing similar work!".
They were also very specific in the legal documents about how he "covered his tracks", I'd recommend reading it rather than the cliff notes version linked here.
I don't understand that.
Laws change to accomodate the facts on the ground, as they should. People leading the changes of facts on the ground are in a natural position to push for corresponding changes in law.
How do you think the first human-driven car was permitted to drive on a street?
Of course not. I'd prefer that he check the regulations, find out that self-driving cars are illegal, and therefore publicly and honestly try to make them legal, in concert with the people who pay him.
In what possible world is that a bad thing to worry about?!
[0] https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B7dzPLynxaXuQjY3dkllZ2ZKb0k...
> Recently, we received an unexpected email. One of our suppliers specializing in LiDAR components sent us an attachment (apparently inadvertently) of machine drawings of what was purported to be Uber’s LiDAR circuit board — except its design bore a striking resemblance to Waymo’s unique LiDAR design.
> We found that six weeks before his resignation this former employee, Anthony Levandowski, downloaded over 14,000 highly confidential and proprietary design files for Waymo’s various hardware systems, including designs of Waymo’s LiDAR and circuit board. To gain access to Waymo’s design server, Mr. Levandowski searched for and installed specialized software onto his company-issued laptop. Once inside, he downloaded 9.7 GB of Waymo’s highly confidential files and trade secrets, including blueprints, design files and testing documentation. Then he connected an external drive to the laptop. Mr. Levandowski then wiped and reformatted the laptop in an attempt to erase forensic fingerprints.
The full legal complaint is at the bottom of that post. It doesn't say how Waymo detected it, but presumably they have internal IT logs.
The claim is not about anything in his brain.
It's an important distinction people are well-advised to remember.
But they actually had a completely written legal complaint and everything.
This cannot end well.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trade_secret#United_States
I think that DTSA may not hold here because it wasn't signed until the events occurred.
I went looking into this after a comment from Animats in yesterday's thread struck me as odd
git clone REPO_NAME
Oh. OK.
The title is not too informative and sort of clickbaity.