There has been an increase in the amount written in the popular press and in professional publications about the importance of intellectual property as a fundamental driver of economic value for companies. In fact, greater than 80% of the economic value of the Standard and Poor’s 500 companies is now linked to intangible assets.1 Consider…
Tag: Trade Secrets
The Siphoning of American Innovation: How China Acquires Technology
You have probably heard by now that China is stealing America’s intellectual property. This has been one of the primary issues in President Trump’s trade war with China—and for good reason. Keith Alexander, the former Director of the National Security Administration, has called this theft the greatest transfer of wealth in history.1 The transfer of…
Keeping Secrets: How Magicians Protect Their Ideas
Magicians and their ideas have come to occupy an area known as IP’s “negative space,” an area where certain creative endeavors lack access to traditional IP protections.1 Scholars have identified other elements that operate in this space including furniture designs, tattoos, computer databases, and hairstyles, among others.2 Legal scholars can gain valuable insights from the…
Uber-Waymo Settlement
The Uber-Waymo1 trade secret dispute was one of the biggest intellectual property disputes of the last few years, with overarching ramifications for the race to bring autonomous driving technology to market. In the summer of 2015, it was reported that Anthony Levandowski, a self-driving-car engineer, began asking other Google employees to join him at…
Google Sues Uber Over Self-Driving Technology
Google’s parent company Alphabet is suing Uber Technologies, alleging Uber stole trade secrets to jump-start its own autonomous vehicle program.1 Waymo, the Alphabet-owned self-driving truck company, has filed against Otto, a self-driving truck company, and its parent company, Uber.2 The suit revolves around former Google employee Anthony Levandowski. Levandowski left Google in 2016 to form…