After four days of trial, Uber settled claims from Waymo (Google) that a former Google engineer had downloaded files before forming his own company that was later bought by Google. As part of the settlement, Waymo gets 0.34 of Uber’s equity, worth about $245 million at Uber’s estimated valuation of $72 billion.
Discussing the settlement, new Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi said his job includes “acknowledging and correcting mistakes of the past.” He continued: “The prospect that a couple of Waymo employees may have inappropriately solicited others to join Otto, and that they may have potentially left with Google files in their possession, in retrospect, raised some hard questions” though he continued to deny that any Waymo trade secrets made their way to Uber.