Uber to Levandowski: We will not pay your $179 million financial obligation to Google

Uber stated it will not be tossing a lifeline to the previous head of its self-driving cars and truck program. When the business employed Anthony Levandowski in 2016, it consented to spend for the star engineer’s legal charges in claims that met him. But, in a court filing recently, Uber stated it declined to pay his $179 million financial obligation to Google.

Levandowski “fraudulently” hidden “the fact that he secretly committed a crime by stealing trade secrets with the intent to use them at Uber,” Uber composed in the filing. “If Uber had known that, it never would have entered into any agreements with Levandowski.” 

Levandowski initially operated at Google, however left in 2016 to begin his own self-driving truck business, which was rapidly obtained by Uber for $680 million. 

Those actions triggered a chain of occasions that resulted in Google’s self-governing automobile system, Waymo, taking legal action against Uber over declared theft of trade tricks associated with self-driving automobiles. That suit settled in February 2018 with Uber accepting pay Waymo $245 million. Uber fired Levandowski the year prior to.

In the consequences of the suit, federal district attorneys brought a criminal suit versus Levandowski on 33 counts of theft and tried theft of trade tricks from Google — to which the engineer pleaded guilty last month. The plea brings an optimal sentence of 10 years in jail and an optimum fine of $250,000.

Simultaneously, Google taken legal action against Levandowski separately in arbitration over stopping his task and breaking his agreement with the tech giant. That case concluded in December with a panel accepting charge Levandowski with the huge $179 million fine. Hours after the multimillion-dollar award to Google was completed last month, Levandowski applied for Chapter 11 personal bankruptcy security.

In the meantime, Uber has actually worked to distance itself from the engineer. In its newest court filing, the business stated it should not be obliged to pay Levandowski’s legal charges according to the arrangement, which is called an indemnification arrangement. Uber stated that’s due to the fact that Levandowski supposedly lied to it about taking trade tricks from Google.

“When Google separately sued both Levandowski and Uber, Uber initially trusted Levandowski’s explanations of what happened,” the ride-hailing business composed in the filing. “Levandowski was then indicted by federal prosecutors for trade secret theft, providing strong evidence that he had been lying all along.”

Levandowski conflicts Uber’s claims. In a March court filing, he stated Uber understood he’d acquired files coming from Google prior to employing him. Levandowski’s legal representative, Neel Chatterjee of Goodwin Procter, included an e-mail on Monday that Uber is simply attempting to leave paying the $179 million fine.

“Uber’s assertion that Anthony did not disclose material information to Uber is false,” Chatterjee stated. “This is the latest in a string of meritless theories Uber has set forth to try to get out of the deal it struck because it did not like the outcome.”

Uber decreased to comment.