SAN FRANCISCO Uber Technologies Inc [UBER.UL] must promptly return stolen confidential files to Alphabet Inc’s (GOOGL.O) Waymo self-driving car unit, a federal judge ruled, while stopping short of shutting down the ride-services company’s autonomous car program.
The judge wrote that Uber knew, or should have known, that an ex-Waymo engineer it later hired had taken Waymo files potentially containing trade secrets, and that some of the intellectual property had “seeped into” Uber’s own development efforts.
The ruling by U.S. District Judge William Alsup in San Francisco, unsealed on Monday, marked a blow to Uber, which is engaged in a battle with Waymo to dominate the fast-growing field of self-driving cars expected to revolutionize the automotive industry.