https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/...-infringement/

Waymo, the new name for Google?s self-driving car project, has sued Uber and self-driving trucking startup Otto over claims of patent infringement.
In a Medium post published Thursday afternoon, Waymo accused Anthony Levandowski?a former Google engineer now working for Uber?of having downloaded ?over 14,000 highly confidential and proprietary design files for Waymo?s various hardware systems.? In particular this allegedly included ?Waymo?s LiDAR and circuit board? designs?a total of nearly 10 gigabytes. Levandowski left Google in January 2016, then founded Otto, which was acquired by Uber several months later.

Just last month, Bloomberg reported that Waymo has been able to slash the production costs of LiDAR by 90 percent.
By November 2015, an internet domain name for the new venture had been registered. And by January 2016, Mr. Levandowski had confided in some Waymo colleagues that he planned to ?replicate? Waymo?s technology at a Waymo competitor. As Waymo would later learn, Mr. Levandowski went to great lengths to take what he needed to ?replicate? Waymo?s technology and then to meet with Uber executives, all while still a Waymo employee.