Tesla has sued manufacturer Rivian and four former employees for the alleged theft of trade secrets. Rivian has denied all the allegations. This is not the first time that Tesla has carried out similar actions, as it currently has an ongoing lawsuit against the Chinese company Xpeng, which it accuses of having appropriated the Autopilot source code through a former employee.
In this lawsuit, filed in a California court, Tesla claims that last week he discovered a troubling pattern in those employees who leave to work for Rivian, whom he accuses of stealing secret and confidential business information. According to Tesla, the rival company encourages these thefts even though its former workers are still subject to a confidentiality agreement.
Tesla specifically accuses recruiters Tami Pascale and Kim Wong of downloading critical documents regarding the massive hiring of staff for the production and sales department. When under pressure, the crew continued to denial, claiming that it was only personal documents. Only after investigators confronted the employees with specific documents taken, Pascale finally confessed to taking the confidential and proprietary documents [from Tesla].
Tesla claims it can demonstrate that one of its former recruiters received instructions from Rivian to obtain confidential brand files. Also, Tesla accuses Jessica Siron of stealing documents related to manufacturing projects, and Carrington Bradley uses their extensive internal company knowledge to put Rivian in touch with crucial Tesla employees involved in the development of the Superchargers to hire them to develop their cargo network.
These four former employees will also be joined later by two others still to be identified, whom Tesla accuses of embezzling trade secrets and confidential information. Rivian currently has 178 former Tesla employees among its ranks, although the company claims that its rival’s allegations are unfounded and run counter to its corporate ethics.