
Uber admits ex-CEO Kalanick knew Levandowski had stolen Google information - wfunction
http://www.sfgate.com/business/technology/article/Uber-knew-fired-exec-had-info-at-center-of-Google-11240545.php
======
sctb
Previous discussion:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14612196](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14612196)

~~~
wfunction
Is this actually a dupe? Old one says Waymo is making an allegation, this one
is saying Uber itself is admitting this...

------
whack
One of the key points is buried a few paragraphs in.

> _" Uber, though, says Kalanick told Levandowski not to bring any of the
> Google information with him to Uber... The filing asserts that Levandowski
> destroyed the disks containing Google's material not long after Kalanick
> told him that Uber didn't want the information on them."_

I have no way of knowing if the above is true, but if so, it paints Kalanick
in a far more positive light than the headline suggests.

~~~
pzh
It sounds more like they decided to throw Levandowski under the bus. Whether
any of that is true or not, they know that it's already an established fact
that Levandowski had the disks with Google information and they can't keep
pretending they didn't know. The only reasonable course of action is for them
to admit that they knew, but that Levandowski was the sole bad actor, and they
didn't want anything to do with the stolen information.

~~~
dmourati
I think you mean they decided to throw Levandowski under the self-driving
truck.

------
parsnipsumthing
Travis Kalanick is clearly an adrenaline junkie. I understand the start-up
CEOs need to be bold but he seems to completely lack the ability to evaluate
and minimize risk. Good strategy isn't just about winning every battle, it's
also about avoiding the battles you don't need to fight. Travis seems like
he's never seen a fight he won't jump into. It's wild.

~~~
Waterluvian
That reminds me of Sun Tzu. It also reminds me of, I forget who, maybe Jobs,
who said not to even compete, just make your competition irrelevant. Ie. Find
a way to not even have to fight the battles.

~~~
rtx
Uber can't make government irrelevant.

------
SimbaOnSteroids
Had Kalanick never heard the story of the Monkey's paw before he used the
thing?

~~~
7ewis
If others haven't heard of it either:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Monkey%27s_Paw](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Monkey%27s_Paw)

------
jpeg_hero
Way overblown headline relative to the filing that 3 long days ago.

I am no fan of Uber but this AP writer is terribly sloppy in his formulations.

> Uber knew fired exec had info at center of Google theft case

Absolutely not what it says in the filing.

All the filing says is Lewendowski tells Travis he has five “disks” of data
from google. It could be a backup of his pst files, roll out plans for Orkut,
cafeteria menues, we have no idea from the filing. So the filing is very far
away from both Uber “admitting” it knew and that this data is the “stolen
information” central to this case.

> The filing asserts that Levandowski destroyed the disks containing Google's
> material not long after Kalanick told him that Uber didn't want the
> information on them.

So sloppy it’s painful.

This implies than Lewendowski propositioned Travis and said “let’s go build
this dirty LIDAR together” and Travis declined. Not supported by the filings!

The incident this refers to was an email thread between Travis and Lewendowski
that had two lawyers Cc’d on. This was perfunctory Dislosure that he has
_some_ info, and a perfunctory response from Travis saying “don’t bring any
info from prior employers.”

If you are going to make a dirty LIDAR you hand off a usb drive on a long walk
across the city, not plot in front of your lawyers.

Again, I am no Uber fan, but this is one of the worst pieces of reporting I’ve
seen that I can remember. Very misleading article.

~~~
watwut
It is quite unlikely that five disks would contain cafeteria menus. I don't
thing that judge would buy such theory as plausible. In any case, it is goggle
data even if not related to cars.

Another question, why would you kept lawyer out of loop if planning to do
something dirty? It is dumb to do it over mail, but lawyer won't rat you put
and can have advice about how best to hide it (in person not in writing sInce
lawyer want to keep license).

------
smcl
Didn't they originally deny that there was any sort of wrongdoing? If so then
why should we believe them now? What I mean is

1\. "There was no problem, nobody stole anything"

2\. "OK fine we knew he stole, but he said he deleted it and we believe him"

Doesn't the flat out lie in #1 completely destroy any sort of admission in
statement #2 that conveniently suggests they're off the hook?

~~~
ehsankia
Well there's a slight difference, it seems like now that Kalanick has left,
they want to use him as a scapegoat, and the narrative here is that Uber as a
whole didn't know until now. So theoretically, 1 & 2 could both be true,
albeit 2 would be more like "Kalanick knew but didn't tell us".

~~~
smcl
True, but if so that's still extremely convenient.

Edit: Pardon my cynicism - I'm just a bit suspicious with things like this :-)

------
emilsedgh
Does anyone know how was Levandowski's startup valued at $680M?

Worst case scenario was that Kalanick not only knew this, actually planned it
with Levandowski.

Reasoning behind the $680M acquisition could be very important.

------
covercash
What's the worst case scenario for Levandowski in this situation?

~~~
jacquesm
Theft is criminal law.

~~~
ndr
How many million dollars would he keep for each year spent in jail?

~~~
mabbo
The civil lawsuit against him would take care of any money he has left.

------
iaw
> "The filing asserts that Levandowski destroyed the disks containing Google's
> material not long after Kalanick told him that Uber didn't want the
> information on them."

A person that takes a trove of proprietary information like that is unlikely
to just destroy it. My suspicion is that he'd keep it for reference until it
became a liability.

------
cylinder
Deep in my comment history I called Kalanick shady many times before all these
headlines...

------
jacquesm
I suspect this is one of the reasons he stepped down.

