Boeing unit ends trade secrets clash over electric air taxis
Industry giant accused rival of poaching employees and stealing confidential data in lawsuit that cast doubt over speedy development of electric aircraft design | New deal marks turning point for innovation in electrically powered aviation.
Boeing subsidiary Wisk Aero and Archer Aviation have officially ended their trade secret dispute concerning environmentally-friendly air transportation, as they reach a settlement on undisclosed terms.
Archer has agreed to make Wisk its exclusive provider of autonomous technology for self-flying aircrafts, said the statement.
In line with the collaboration, Boeing is investing in Archer to “support the integration of Wisk’s autonomous technology in future variants of Archer’s aircraft”.
Case background
Wisk filed the lawsuit against Archer in June 2021, alleging the theft of trade secrets with regard to its electric aircraft developments.
The suit, filed in the US District Court, Northern District of California, concerned the development of an electric vertical takeoff and landing (eVTOL) aircraft, which is propelled by electric power and ascends like a helicopter but flies like a plane.
The lawsuit alleged the theft of aircraft designs, component designs, system designs, facility inventory, and test data, as well as the infringement of US patents, numbers: 10,364,036, 9,764,833, 10,110,033, and 10,333,328.
The ‘036 patent is “directed to a multicopter aircraft that is capable of vertical flight for take-off and landing, hover, and forward flight”.
The ‘833 patent is “directed to a rotor mounting boom for a personal aircraft configured to provide safe operations while achieving robust control and efficient maintenance”.
And patents ‘033 and ‘328 relate to the “multi-battery charging station which selectively connects battery sub-modules to a common power bus for charging”.
Swift development of aircraft design
The legal dispute arose when Archer announced its intention to release its own eVTOL aircraft in February 2021.
In its lawsuit, Wisk said that Archer claimed to be able to develop a full-scale aircraft in two years, with full commercialisation in four, which it said: “cannot be explained through independent development”.
The company further insisted that “it appears that Archer’s business is built on IP that is not its own”, pointing to Archer’s swift development of an aircraft design that allegedly resembled a confidential patent application submitted by Wisk in January 2020.
This, alongside alleged patent infringements related to aircraft design innovation, thermal management, and battery architecture, formed the basis of Wisk’s lawsuit.
Targeted recruitment
The complaint also claimed that during the parties' legal battle, Archer attempted targeted recruitment of Wisk’s engineers, which led to former employees allegedly downloading secret files before they left Wisk.
Thomas Muniz, Wisk’s former vice president of hardware engineering, left the company in December 2019 after being approached by Archer.
Wisk alleged that before his departure he allegedly wiped forensic evidence from one of his computer hard drives, removing computer activity such as file browsing, downloads, and internet history.
Exporting information
Wisk said that another employee revealed that he downloaded nearly two dozen slide presentations from the firm’s secure, corporate Google Drive repository during that same month.
The suit outlined similar situations of employees allegedly exporting information before their departures from Wisk.
Wisk classified the alleged stolen files into five general categories of trade secrets: aircraft designs, component designs, system designs, facility inventory, and test data.
Archer’s investment materials, showcasing the allegedly infringed design and architecture, pushed Wisk to take legal action, said the suit.
Archer’s co-founders had also openly praised Wisk’s aircraft and its engineers, according to the complaint.
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