
Ask HN: What becomes of Anthony Lewandowski and Uber if Google Wins? - wonder_bread
Uber&#x27;s entire timetable towards a profitable business model depends on being (among the) first to market with a competitive A to B self-driving solution. If Waymo err.. Google err.. Alphabet gets the victory in District court, what becomes of one of the fastest growing businesses in the world?
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AnimalMuppet
IANAL. But Levandowski tried to "plead the Fifth" on testimony that he was not
giving, on a case that he is not a party to. That should not fly, and did not.
(Uber went along with it because it could help them in the case, and because
they have some kind of obligation to try to defend Levandowski.)

Nobody seems to be contesting that Levandowski took a bunch of documents from
Google (Waymo). If they want to, they can almost certainly make Uber choose
between stopping working on self-driving cars, and firing or transferring
Levandowski.

There's also the possibility that Levandowski goes to jail over this (I don't
think his trying to plead the Fifth was just gamesmanship).

Bottom line: My best guess is that Uber is able to continue, but they have to
throw Levandowski under the bus to do so. I don't know to what degree that
will hurt them.

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19eightyfour
History is written by the winners. Court battles are dragged out by the
losers.

My point is that, IMO, these kind of "IP" cases, never impede an actually
successful business. And that if a business fails, and also has IP suits
against it, it is for other business reasons that it failed.

I'm no IP lawyer ( that's probably helpful here ), but looking at Oracle vs
Google, Samsung v Apple, IIRC, that actually more legitimate business didn't
get impeded and just kept going.

My prediction is that if Uber falls it won't be IP suits that deal the fatal
blow.

I think this is generally because courts move slower than the world, and both
sides are, usually, "essentially matched" since they can both afford solid
legal teams.

All this sort of leads to the conclusion that IP has mostly defensive, and
capital benefits ( owning IP can deter people entering market or suing, and IP
can add to value of transactions ), but it doesn't have the power to prevent
other people using your invention ( as I think the intent of patents
originally was, exclusive use ).

