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posted by martyb on Wednesday October 03 2018, @08:11AM   Printer-friendly
from the money-for-nothing-and-your-chips-go-free dept.

Engineer spends $6,000 invalidating Waymo's lidar patents

An engineer with no connection to the self-driving industry has spent $6,000 of his own money to stop Alphabet's self-driving car business Waymo from patenting key technology. Following a challenge filed by Eric Swildens, the US Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) rejected 53 out of 56 claims in Waymo's 936 patent. The reason for his action? He just "couldn't imagine the [lidar] circuit [described in the 936 patent] didn't exist prior," Ars Technica reported.

Filed in 2013 and granted in 2016, the 936 patent was a cornerstone of Waymo's lawsuit against Uber, which began in December 2016. In a nutshell, Waymo accused the ride-hailing giant of infringing its lidar design patent and using intellectual property allegedly stolen by engineer Anthony Levandowski. Uber eventually agreed to redesign its lidar and gave Waymo $245 million worth of equity to settle the rest of the lawsuit. It also promised not to copy Waymo's technology in the future.

Uber got slammed for nothing!

Previously: A Spectator Who Threw A Wrench In The Waymo/Uber Lawsuit
Waymo and Uber Abruptly Settle for $245 Million

Related: Waymo's Case Against Uber "Shrinks" After Trade Secret Claim Thrown Out
Waymo v. Uber Jury Trial Begins


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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 03 2018, @06:10PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 03 2018, @06:10PM (#743530)

    if Waymo had suspected the patent might have been invalid, would they have been able to use that in their defence?

    Any chance Waymo can get the $245 million back?

    I am not a lawyer, and I don't know the details of the lawsuit.

    Note that patents are different than copyright, and other forms of IP. Even if the patent is invalid, if Uber did copy code, it's still illegal.

    For example, the bubblesort algorithm is clearly not patent-able (... well, shouldn't be... who knows what the PTO says). However, if I write my own bubblesort, and then somebody else comes and copy-pastes it, then I could still file some lawsuit them against them for copyright infringement, theft, or something else.