Tesla is accusing self-driving car startup Zoox and former employees of stealing trade secrets.
The automaker is suing the start-up and the bunch claiming the employees gave Zoox Tesla’s logistics info to Zoox, while another gave Tesla’s autopilot code to Xiaopeng Motors.
Two lawsuits were filed this week with one claiming employees stole “proprietary information and trade secrets to help Zoox leapfrog past years of work needed to develop and run its own warehousing, logistics, and inventory control operations,” Tesla said in court documents.
The company contended the four employees “absconded with select proprietary Tesla documents useful to their new employer,” and that at least one used confidential information to poach other employees in what the company described as blatant and intentional theft.
In a separate case, Tesla said a former employee stole Telsa’s Autopilot driver assistant source code before taking a job at Chinese electric automaker Xiaopeng Motors, or XPeng.
The company claimed the former employee was part of an elite team of engineers who abruptly quit his job just a few months after he uploaded copies of the companies source code to his personal iCloud account in violation of company policy.
