Alphabet's Waymo Demanded $1 Billion In Settlement Talks With Uber (reuters.com)

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Reuters: Alphabet's Waymo sought at least $1 billion in damages and a public apology from Uber as conditions for settling its high-profile trade secret lawsuit against the ride-services company, sources familiar with the proposal told Reuters. The Waymo self-driving car unit also asked that an independent monitor be appointed to ensure Uber does not use Waymo technology in the future, the sources said. Uber rejected those terms as non-starters, said the sources, who were not authorized to publicly discuss settlement talks. The precise dollar amount requested by Waymo and the exact time the offer was made could not be learned.

Waymo's tough negotiating stance, which has not been previously reported, reflects the company's confidence in its legal position after months of pretrial victories in a case which may help to determine who emerges in the forefront of the fast-growing field of self-driving cars. The aggressive settlement demands also suggest that Waymo is not in a hurry to resolve the lawsuit, in part because of its value as a distraction for Uber leadership, said Elizabeth Rowe, a trade secret expert at the University of Florida Levin College of Law.

Comments

Makes sense to me

[Anonymous Coward]

Uber, and the rest of the tech industry, needs to stop stealing their IP and develop their own.

Sounds like a healthy discount

[RhettLivingston]

This sounds like a healthy discount versus paying the attorney's fees and the $1.86 billion in damages that it was last reported that they are seeking. Certainly, it is a reasonable point to start negotiations.

Re:Sounds like a healthy discount

[sehlat]

1.86gigabucks sounds to me as if it's way mo' than they should get.

Re:Sounds like a healthy discount

[rtb61]

Sounds way over the top, as Uber is more likely to go belly up long before they can make that kind of money out of auto driving. Auto drive, why pay uber anything. Anyone can do it, most likely direct investors, finance and insurance companies, simple straight forward investments with a set return, what the hell do you need uber for. Automation hardware and software is where it is at and even automotive manufacturers can do it direct much like they do the car lease market, pretty much the same thing, just really short term leases. Suing uber is like Google lawyers are just hungry for Googles money and yeah, so what, you can join uber's other creditors to get your cents on the dollar. Alphabet are just being dicks, starting to throw their weight around and pretend for marketing purposes they are not google.

Re:Sounds like a healthy discount

[PoopJuggler]

Seems reasonable to me, if not low. Autonomous vehicles will be the light bulb of this century. The value and potential impact of the technology is almost unimaginable.

Cue Dr. Evil

[jfdavis668]

Hold out for 100 Billion Dollars. And sharks with frickin laser beams attached to their heads.

Re:Cue Dr. Evil

[ClickOnThis]

I just had a thought...

With a LIDAR sensor-array loaded with frickin' lasers on its roof, wouldn't a cool name for their self-driving car be the Google Shark?

Naaah...

Fuck Google

[Anonymous Coward]

And their holding companies and subsidiaries, in absentia, forever.

Uber at it's best

[Anonymous Coward]

Uber lawyers (who's jobs is to strongly advocate their clients positions) have refused to admit guilt or sleazy behavior. Film at eleven (and those lawyers have a future jobs with Harvey Weinstein defending his sleazy behavior).

The new CEO was supposed to turn the corner, but instead he (and the board) seem to be digging in. The proper answer would be to throw Kalanick to the dogs and let him deal with a billion dollar judgement.

There is another reason for this....

[Anonymous Coward]

In my opinion, Alphabet absolutely do not want to settle this case, but they need to be see as being open to a settlement as part of the process. I think they're confident they have a case that can be won, but I think they know they won't get anywhere close to $1 Billion. However, I think the ultimate target is Levandowski. He has asserted his Fifth Amendment rights, so bringing a case against him without Uber's help is going to be next to impossible. But, if they succeed against Uber in court, then it gives Alphabet a much better standing to file a criminal complaint against Levandowski.

Good luck with that

[slashdice]

Google has a slam dunk case. Unfortunately, it's against Anthony Lewinsky, not Uber. They literally have nothing on Uber. If they're lucky, maybe they can get a court appointed monitor (and Google will pick up the tab) to make sure they don't use Waymo tech in the future. More likely, the case will get tossed like Rose McGowen's asshole when Harvey Weinstein invites her over a to "read a script" (guess it was a porno?)

They can't really do anything about Anthony Lewinsky because ... they made him (and all their employees) sign an arbitration agreement. Kind of fucked themselves in the ass with that one, just like Harvey Weinstein.