
Uber and Waymo Reach Settlement - chollida1
https://www.uber.com/newsroom/uber-waymo-settlement/
======
roymurdock
Good behind the scenes analysis of why Waymo's case was flimsy here from Sarah
Jeong, a lawyer and journalist who has been live tweeting the trial:

[https://www.theverge.com/2018/2/8/16993208/waymo-v-uber-
tria...](https://www.theverge.com/2018/2/8/16993208/waymo-v-uber-trial-trade-
secrets-lidar)

Summary - Waymo was claiming Uber violated 8 trade secrets (down from 100s),
and had only directly discussed these trade secrets for 45 minutes over the
past week. "Can you really explain eight self-driving car trade secrets in 45
minutes?"

"And then there’s the part where Anthony Levandowski is not on trial, Uber is.
Even if Levandowski took 14,000 confidential documents, that doesn’t mean that
Uber did something wrong — there isn’t a clear link to how those documents got
onto Uber computers or were used in Uber self-driving cars."

~~~
manux
She makes a number of fair points, but:

> Can you really explain eight self-driving car trade secrets in 45 minutes?

Maybe I'm fooling myself, but I think I can do that in 45 seconds.

    
    
      - hey what's your learning rate scheduling for module X?
      - we use an EMA with coefficient 1e-4
      - oh great, and for Y, do you do constant strides?
      - no we use backtracking to figure out some sampling heuristic
    

etc.

~~~
verroq
Parameters are probably the lowest hanging fruit in any machine learning
optimisation, being a trade secret is a big stretch.

Also use LBFG so you never worry about learning rate.

~~~
eachro
Hyperparameter optimization for neural networks can be insanely expensive
though[1], to the point where there are even startups (e.g: SigOpt) that do
this. [1]
[https://twitter.com/beenwrekt/status/961263599674150912](https://twitter.com/beenwrekt/status/961263599674150912)

~~~
kirillseva
the tweet you link to is architectural search, or figuring out what the neural
network should look like (along with its parameters).

If self-driving car ML is "data scientists replacing a driver with computers",
architecture search is computers replacing data scientists. $1.2M is roughly
3-4 data scientists' annual compensations at a company like Google or Uber.

Finding hyperparameters for an existing architecture is much easier because
you would typically deal with a much lower cardinality in hyperparameter
space. SigOpt is helping with that. Google has an internal solution that is
able to take advantage of parameters within their job scheduling
infrastructure (they actually have a bunch of them, the one I'm talking about
is called hyperband [0]). CERN, as far as I know, was using hyperopt [1].
Avant uses an open-source version of SigOpt that we wrote in 2016 called loop
[2].

[0] -
[https://arxiv.org/pdf/1603.06560.pdf](https://arxiv.org/pdf/1603.06560.pdf)
[1] - [http://hyperopt.github.io/hyperopt](http://hyperopt.github.io/hyperopt)
[2] - [https://github.com/avantoss/loop](https://github.com/avantoss/loop)

~~~
pc86
Before this gets inundated with people making comments about Googler data
scientists making $400k, these are folks with PhDs in math or statistics, very
accomplished academic literature, leaders in their fields. These are not
people messing around with Haskell on the weekends and leaving an insurance
firm's IT department to go to Google.

~~~
snotrockets
They also don't make $400k – an engineer that costs $400k doesn't get that in
take home pay.

~~~
pc86
There are enough non-executive engineers at Google making half a million or
more base/cash comp that you could fill a room with them. That's not the
point.

------
edshiro
Really surprised this ended so quickly. Did Waymo and Uber reach a settlement
that early because:

\- the former felt this was the "best" it could get in such a situation as
their case was not as strong as they initially thought

\- the latter was not keen on having its image dragged into the mud any
further and may also be aware that more incriminating material could surface
if Google or others dug further?

IANAL, but I find the resolution of this case quite puzzling... Also what does
it mean for Uber's self-driving car development efforts?

~~~
ChuckMcM
It does have the feel of a TV show at this point. Given @sarahjeong's coverage
on Twitter and in the Verge I would not be surprised if Waymo's legal team
felt they were going to at least not win, and might lose.

And to my thinking Waymo had lots more to lose than Uber did. (and I think
that is reflected in the settlement being not quite 13% of what they were
asking, and in stock which may be completely worthless). Waymo loses and it
might embolden other Google employees to go to competitors, it might embolden
those competitors to try to recruit their top engineers to bring their ideas
into the competitor. It might completely blunt Googles ability to get any
engineer to believe what the company thinks of as trade secrets would actually
be considered trade secrets in a court and so they aren't as threatening as
before. And on cross examination Uber might have pulled some things into open
court and the public record that Waymo would rather not have out there.

Uber on the other hand already has a reputation as being a rule breaker, and
skating over the line. So what do they have to lose? I Waymo can take $1.9
billion in _cash_ out of Uber (maybe more if they can get lawyers fees etc)
they can take them off the board completely.

According to the coverage they were being berated by the judge and their case
had gone from being about patents to about trade secrets to about 8 trade
secrets. That is not a legal case gaining steam, that is one that is trying to
stay alive.

~~~
halflings
Lewandowski's credibility is in the gutter after this. There is proof of him
siphoning confidential documents, data, from Google's internal systems.

I'm not sure how Waymo losing would make it less threatening for people to do
the same thing? They now know more than ever that anything they do to
internal/confidential data is being monitored.

~~~
ChuckMcM
Lucky for him he seems to have escaped with enough money that he can live
comfortably without ever being employed again. If you look at his situation
objectively I find it hard not qualify him as pulling off the heist of the
century. He gets a ton of bonus money from Google, he gets a bunch of buyout
money from Uber, he gets Uber to indemnify him from any legal repercussions.
And he has plenty of cash to make it super painful for Google to try and claw
back anything as well.

So change your name, move to a different area, change your hair style and
voila, playboy at large.

~~~
ggg9990
Why change his name and haircut? As Silicon Valley becomes more like Wall
Street this behavior is not condemned but celebrated and even admired.

------
a13n
"Waymo is getting .34% of Uber's equity in the settlement, which at a $72
billion valuation, is valued at about $245 million."

[https://twitter.com/RMac18/status/961993637348327424](https://twitter.com/RMac18/status/961993637348327424)

~~~
theptip
That's a stale valuation, Uber's latest round was significantly down from
that. The Softbank tender valued Uber at $48B, so a more up-to-date estimate
would be:

    
    
      0.34 * 0.01 * $48B = $0.163B

~~~
ahupp
They aren't directly comparable given the difference between common and
preferred shares.

~~~
fbdjskajxb
Do we know if Uber is getting preferred or common shares in the settlement?

~~~
fbdjskajxb
s/Uber/Google

------
mabbo
This isn't about something new happening in the fight itself- it's about the
economy lately (imho).

This was a fight they could have drawn out. They could have claimed it wasn't
their fault, they could have paid enough legal fees to win the day. But it was
always going to be a waste of time, in a literal sense. Years could have gone
by before any decision, holding back Uber the entire time.

Uber is still a black hole for money but VCs see it's potential and keep
throwing money at it. So long as that money kept coming, Uber could do
anything they want really.

But then the market started crashing. The last week has been a wake up call
that things are a-changin'. In another six months, there may not be VC money
being thrown around anymore. And then you'd have Uber actually in a crunch.
What then?

By settling today, Uber may have the time it needs to get their self-driving
fleet in the road before the money runs out for good. That's all that matters
to keep the company alive, and Khosrowshahi knows it.

But if he'd been smart, he'd have settled six months ago instead.

~~~
encoderer
Lawyers don’t work fast enough for this to have anything to do with stock
market pullback.

~~~
mabbo
They can if you pay them enough. Or if this contingency plan was written 3
months ago just in case the economy finally faltered.

~~~
eclipxe
Yeah, no. That's not how this works.

~~~
mabbo
Seriously though- beyond a dismissive snarky reply, what is your view on it?
Why now? Why not six months ago and why not fight to the end?

It's fine to disagree, but don't just tell me I'm wrong, convince me I'm
wrong!

~~~
eclipxe
Apologies, you're right. My reply was pretty dismissive and snarky (hey, it's
HN, that's what we do, right?) but I should have been more thoughtful in my
response!

------
woodandsteel
I think what happened is Levandowski and Uber acted in a very suspicious way
that lead Waymo to conclude that Uber must have stolen its IP. But then when
it came to discovery they couldn't find solid evidence (either because the
property was not used, or Uber managed to destroy the evidence), and so Waymo
realized it was probably going to lose the trial.

In the meantime, the lawsuit helped kick Kalanick out, and he was replaced by
someone much more reasonable who wanted to end the lawsuit. As a consequence
the two parties were able to come to an agreement.

~~~
jamiequint
This theory is so wildly off from what my lawyer friends have told me about
the case (including one who has 5+ years of IP law experience)

They are mostly in agreement that Google had enough to win the case but that
they likely had the worry that juries are always unpredictable and you really
never know what will happen. They seem to believe that the thing that Google
cared about the most was restricting Uber's usage of the stolen technology.
They believe that Uber felt they had a decent chance of losing so they
mutually agreed to setting, giving Google what they wanted (restriction of the
technology usage). Once that was offered Google immediately moved to settle
since that was what they wanted from the outset and any additional cash or
destruction of Uber's image would have been beyond their needs.

~~~
inverse_pi
If you look at the settlement number, 0.34% of Uber at 72B (yes, 72B, not 45B
as the recent down round which would equate to 150M), then you'll see that
Google did not expect to win this case.

~~~
traek
Nobody said that Google expected to win the case.

------
burner890
Anyone who thinks this is a loss for Uber doesn't know what was at stake in
this case. At one point an injunction against Uber's self-driving division was
on the table. If that were still any sort of possibility Uber would have ended
up paying far more than a couple hundred million in equity to settle the case.

I think it's safe to say this wasn't really about theft of trade secrets by
Uber. We can infer this because Google's lawyers would have known exactly how
weak their case against Uber was when nothing of substance turned up as part
of discovery. Google decided to go to trial anyway. They knew that Uber's
ailing brand would make them _seem_ guilty in the public eye even though they
clearly weren't.

I can't prove this, but I think this was a chillingly opportunistic move by
Google that was designed mainly to stop the loss of top engineering talent to
Uber ATG. After all, who would want to go to join a company which appeared to
be in serious legal jeopardy?

I'd speculate that Uber's current leadership saw an opportunity to immediately
stop the damage to their brand and took it. Part of me wishes TK were still
running the show because he probably would not have settled.

------
robterrell
"To be clear, while we do not believe that any trade secrets made their way
from Waymo to Uber, nor do we believe that Uber has used any of Waymo’s
proprietary information in its self-driving technology, we are taking steps
with Waymo to ensure our Lidar and software represents just our good work."

I feel like there's a contradiction inside this sentence.

Is this an admission that some of Uber's technology came from Waymo, but
merely things that are not trade secrets / proprietary information?

~~~
philfrasty
While there may in fact be some truths to the allegations this seems more like
a standard settlement phrase to me.

Got sued a lot of times myself for various (business related) reasons.
Sometimes just faster to pay than see how it plays out.

------
habosa
So what is Lewandowski's final status here? I know he doesn't work at Uber
anymore, but did he keep all the money?

Seems like he got a pretty good deal if so, he's retired with hundreds of
millions.

~~~
hn_throw_1234
He made very little off of Uber since his comp was tied to milestones related
to Otto's technology

~~~
burner890
The equity he received from Otto's acquisition was also clawed back because he
was fired with cause. He ended up with nothing from Uber.

------
rdiddly
_" But the prospect that a couple of Waymo employees may have inappropriately
solicited others to join Otto, and that they may have potentially left with
Google files in their possession, in retrospect, raised some hard questions."_

"Hard questions" \-- That's a good one! Not only because of its velvety-smooth
use of euphemism, but because it's basically true: We enlist the help of the
judicial system to answer questions that are hard. And an accusation that the
accused denies, fits in that category. Filing a lawsuit is essentially asking
a "hard question" along the lines of "Should the other party be obligated to
compensate us for damages?" One side says yes, the other says no. Hard
question!

I'll have to use that one sometime. I really need to learn the art of
executive-speak if I'm to advance in this life. But I suspect I'll just
stubbornly stay my same tactless self.

------
hawktheslayer
> " _may have potentially_ "

This kind of language must be intentional given the team that reviewed and
edited the memo, which makes it worse to my ears. Either "may have" or
"potentially" would have sufficed.

~~~
bradfitz
The lawyers get paid per weasel word!

------
samfisher83
google used to own 7% of uber. I don't know what it is now, but lets say its
5% that stake would be 3.5bil at 72bil valuation . If they are getting .34%
essentially they are losing money from GV losing money as a share holder while
waymo is gaining some, but they are both google companies.

I don't see how this lawsuit benefits google shareholders as a whole. They
just wasted money on lawyers.

~~~
bvod
Google has an in-house litigation team that would have already been on
payroll. Sure they had to pay for expert witnesses and court fees, but the
total would be far less than what they settled for

~~~
jankeymeulen
Charles Verhoeven, afaik the lead attorney for Waymo is definitely not on
Alphabet payroll.

------
sleepychu
Estimate of total legal cost to Uber and Waymo combined?

------
ProAm
Kind of a disappointing end to such a lengthy and publicized build up.

~~~
jonknee
It was always going to end with money, this just fast forwards it a bit.

~~~
nissimk
When Intel stole Digital's alpha technology the lawsuit ended with intel
acquiring the Digital chip business. I guess that's also sort of money, but
not exactly.

------
tyingq
I wonder if this means Levandowski is also personally off the hook now as
well.

Also, I'm not clear how much he actually netted from Otto, since lots was
probably based on vesting that didn't happen.

~~~
csours
Is there any motivation for Waymo and Uber to work together to burn
Levandowski?

If not, he's {probably} off the hook.

------
cavanasm
I recall earlier news stories that Waymo's first settlement proposal last year
included demands for a public apology from Uber. Is this that? I wonder if
Uber is also paying $1b like Waymo initially demanded, or if that part changed
as well.

[https://www.reuters.com/article/us-alphabet-uber-
lawsuit/exc...](https://www.reuters.com/article/us-alphabet-uber-
lawsuit/exclusive-alphabets-waymo-demanded-1-billion-in-settlement-talks-with-
uber-sources-idUSKBN1CH0QC)

------
username223
That was quick. What would Uber and/or Google have been embarrassed to see
become public? And will Lewandowski get to quietly sneak away, or will both
companies now pillory him?

~~~
bertil
Once evidence is revealed, there isn’t much new for lawyers to discover: good,
experience negotiators know what angle the other side is going to take and
after opening arguments, even that is pretty settled.

------
bertil
I appreciate the overall conciliatory tone (with the usual “we did nothing
illegal” caution) but I’m not seeing mention of any financial settlement. I
can’t imagine that didn’t happen.

~~~
yathern
"Waymo is getting .34% of Uber's equity in the settlement, which at a $72
billion valuation, is valued at about $245 million."

[https://twitter.com/RMac18/status/961993637348327424](https://twitter.com/RMac18/status/961993637348327424)

~~~
vuln
Still less than Uber paid for ottomotto. Crazy.

------
thecolorblue
Is there any precedent for settling with stock? I would imagine this could
create a dangerous standard.

~~~
jsjohnst
Tons of precedent. In fact, Google paid Yahoo stock worth about the same
amount to settle the Overture suit.

------
laveur
I have to say that this is kind of surprising but thinking about it all
logically it seems like there is a lot more to this story.

First off as others have pointed out Waymo's case wasn't a slam dunk. So they
settled for way less than they originally wanted.

But there are several other interesting things to note. Because of this case
there is now a criminal investigation into Uber's acquisition of Otto. I feel
like part of why Uber settled was because they knew this was being
investigated and dragging out this case in court may have made public some
really incriminating evidence in the criminal investigation.

What further leads me to believe this is the case is the fact that the current
CEO has basically admitted that the acquisition of Otto should have been
handled differently. It seems like they knew that Otto may have stolen trade
secrets from Waymo. It also appears that Uber may have had helped set up Otto
from the start to acquire such information. For this we will have to wait and
see how the criminal investigation shakes out. At which point we could see
federal charges appear against Uber and Levandowski. We may also see the SEC
step into this as well if they did appear to set up Otto as a Shell company to
acquire stolen technologies. Time will tell.

------
crsv
The statement might as well have just been the title. It was completely void
of substance.

------
bprasanna
That is called a positive attitude towards accepting mistakes and moving
forward. Uber finally got a good CEO.

------
thecybernerd
I wonder if Uber will license Waymos driverless technology?

~~~
bertil
If they do, Waymo will most likely have a clause that allows them to pull if
away or a price point that prevents Uber from operating profitably once Waymo
is in full force.

A small sign of that: I generally order Ubers from Google Maps. Until
recently, I was sent to Uber app; lately, it’s an entire experience through
GMaps. I suspect they are planning to switch that default to Waymo wherever
they are.

~~~
alextheparrot
Can you select which one you’d prefer to use? This seems like another anti-
trust case in the making.

~~~
puzzle
You can book either Uber or even Lyft from Google Maps (assuming they are
available in your location). Once the ride starts, you can follow progress
from either Google Maps or the Uber app. You can still book and track the
whole thing from the Uber app, of course.

I prefer GM because it has all my bookmarks, it doesn't download the same map
tiles again, etc. Until recently, it was quite annoying, because you were
trapped in "Uber mode" during a ride. As of a few months ago, you can go back
to the base map, start new searches, look up transit directions, etc. and
later return to your ride's status.

------
lorenzhs
The page redirects to a non-existent page in some countries, here's an archive
link for anyone else who can't access it:
[http://archive.is/0YuQe](http://archive.is/0YuQe)

------
sneak
> To be clear, while we do not believe that any trade secrets made their way
> from Waymo to Uber, nor do we believe that Uber has used any of Waymo’s
> proprietary information in its self-driving technology, we are taking steps
> with Waymo to ensure our Lidar and software represents just our good work.

At what point do statements like this start to harm a company rather than
benefit it? It is plain to see that they are lying; if the first is true the
second part would not be happening.

------
empressplay
Uber and Waymo announced on Friday that they had settled a high-stakes court
battle with Alphabet subsidiary Waymo over trade secrets related to self-
driving cars.

As part of the settlement, Uber will pay Waymo 0.34% of Uber equity, valued at
Series G-1 round at an approximate $US72B valuation.

Uber’s CEO also “expressed regret for the actions” that led to the lawsuit.

~~~
bertil
It is interesting that Alphabet will accept stock because that means they
believe they can carry it to market (or at least, won’t lower its value until
it does) which might still take more than a year.

This could mean Waymo will probably not be able to announce anything
significant until then: Uber would suffer from having such a big rival step
up. Internal politics at Alphabet must be fun.

~~~
dragonwriter
> It is interesting that Alphabet will accept stock because that means they
> believe they can carry it to market (or at least, won’t lower its value
> until it does) which might still take more than a year.

It doesn't mean Alphabet thinks the stock won't lose value, it means that they
think that it won't lose _enough_ value to be worth less than what they could
have gotten in cash, either in a settlement or (discounted for risk and time,
and netted against the expense of continuing) from taking the lawsuit to it's
conclusion.

> This could mean Waymo will probably not be able to announce anything
> significant until then: Uber would suffer from having such a big rival step
> up.

Is $245 million really worth any significant risk to Alphabet’s position in
self-driving cars? I suspect they’d accept the risk to the value of the Uber
stock to maximize their own future prospects in that market.

~~~
jacksmith21006
Google already has 7% of Uber so just adding to what they already have.

------
montrose
Uber was right to cave. Google is not a litigious company, and would not have
sued unless Uber had behaved really badly.

~~~
pavlov
It doesn’t make sense to apply anthropomorphized motivations to giant
corporations. Google’s IPR management is not that different from the others.
They will litigate if it’s to their advantage.

Maybe the reason Google hasn’t been suing much until now is that they’ve
largely been on the borrowing end of the deal (cf. Android’s debt to Sun and
Apple).

~~~
jacksmith21006
Just not Google's approach to sue others. Think in this case just too much too
let it go. You can see it elsewhere with all the research papers and open
sourcing so much software. I mean OS K8s was a little nuts, imo.

------
cft
Very good lesson:risk pays off. Lewandowski risked and it paid off.

~~~
objclxt
> Lewandowski risked and it paid off.

Levandowski was fired from Uber, is still in arbitration with Waymo, and
possibly has a federal investigation pending against him (which is why he has,
and was planning to, take the fifth amendment). I'm not sure how it "paid off"
here.

~~~
joering2
I think his firing was only PR. Seems like he is still at Uber:

[https://www.linkedin.com/in/anthony-
levandowski-8164291/](https://www.linkedin.com/in/anthony-
levandowski-8164291/)

------
mataya
I would like to see more actions that show they mean what they say.

~~~
bertil
They did get rid of a handful of employees that were considered rowdy, handsy
or sexist. Internally, I’m told the changes are quite dramatic. The public
tone around the legality of their offering, notably in London, is a bit like
this note: far more consensual but not clearly stepping down. They want to
serve London and Londoners need the service (minicabs aren’t able to produce
software at the quality Uber does) so to me, that sound much better. More
recently, they did publish detailed data to help a conversation on gender-
balance of their driver compensation (not where I expected them to have their
main problem, but good for them to inform the conversation on pay gap).

I don’t think Dara is an angel, far from it — I got internal rumours that he’s
more than willing to punish good people if that makes him look tough and,
honestly, he needs to. Rather than let him cull randomly until he feels like
he’s done enough, we could help him pick the bad:

Were would you expect them to lead? Serious question: I know many employees
read HN, and I’m happy to point some of the more respectful and change-prone
ones to your suggestions.

------
loverofthings
It's amazing how judicial system works fast in the USA. In my country both
companies would go bankrupt and would still be suing each other due to sunk
cost fallacy.

------
jfig
«...we are taking steps with Waymo to ensure our Lidar and software represents
just our good work.»

Waymo will have access to Ubers Lidar and software.

And an admission of guilt.

------
utopcell
Uber has bad connotations in my head. To be honest, I'd rather Google didn't
hold a stake at it.

------
zpatel
google is looking like microsoft of yesterday, although i had high hopes from
google.

------
bradtemp
Big victory for Uber

[http://ideas.4brad.com/uber-and-waymo-settle-lawsuit-
giant-v...](http://ideas.4brad.com/uber-and-waymo-settle-lawsuit-giant-
victory-uber)

------
aresant
The statement from Uber's new CEO on this settlement is concise:

[https://www.uber.com/newsroom/uber-waymo-
settlement/](https://www.uber.com/newsroom/uber-waymo-settlement/)

~~~
rdiddly
Yes I believe I saw that recently...

~~~
Zhyl
If not, you can find it here:

[https://www.uber.com/newsroom/uber-waymo-
settlement/](https://www.uber.com/newsroom/uber-waymo-settlement/)

~~~
wand3r
link to the HN discussion
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16341094](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16341094)

------
sneak
This is disgusting. I recognize that the moat that the government provides via
the nonsense system that is IP is an incentive for investment, but the very
notion of intellectual property should fly in the face of the moral code of
every single person who works at a business built on Linux or HTTP.

The future the Earth needs is only delayed by these moats of who-can-use-
which-research.

You don’t own your discoveries or ideas, any more than you can own a song that
you sing to another person. The moment something leaves your head, that
information is no longer yours—it enriches the whole world, and that is how it
should be.

I am the staunchest defender of property rights—but information can never be
property.

~~~
paulgb
> information can never be property

Property is an artificial construct, it's up to society how we define what
property is and how laws protect it. In this case, Google and Waymo are
literally building fake cities to create this IP. That money needs to come
from somewhere or that research won't happen, and a temporary monopoly on the
IP it generates seems like a fair trade-off for society.

~~~
sneak
Property is not an artificial construct; it is a natural right. You must
physically harm me to remove that which is inside of my closed fist.

Intellectual Property, however, is made-up fairytale nonsense.

~~~
daveed
How many of your belongings can you hold in your closed fist?

