Waymo on Thursday filed a suit against Uber and its Otto self-driving tech unit in federal court in San Francisco, claiming the ride-hailing giant stole its patents and trade secrets. The company learned of this after a supplier to Waymo sent it images of a LiDAR circuit board, presumably from Uber, that resembled its own. Using a Google-issued laptop, “he downloaded 9.7 GB of Waymo’s highly confidential files and trade secrets, including blueprints, design files and testing documentation. Months before the mass download of files, Mr. Levandowski told colleagues that he had plans to “replicate” Waymo’s technology at a competitor. “Our parent company Alphabet has long worked with Uber in many areas, and we didn’t make this decision lightly,” Waymo said.

Source: Forbes February 24, 2017 00:15 UTC