Auto industry experts were shocked when Uber settled the lawsuit brought by Waymo weeks before the trial was expected to end. Google engineer Anthony Levandowski had allegedly stolen trade secrets when he left to form his own self-driving company Otto, which Uber then purchased in 2016. This is not the first time Uber has been under scrutiny and investigation for legal matters: “Uber’s business practices have raised eyebrows for a long time,” says PVMI director John Paul MacDuffie.
“There was this cloud of suspicion around just about everything Uber said, not just because of this case but because of other cases,” he adds.
In an interview with Knowledge@Wharton, Wharton’s John Paul MacDuffie and Santa Clara University’s Eric Goldman discuss the Uber-Waymo settlement.