Secretive Magic Leap Says Ex-Engineer Copied Headset For China (bloomberg.com) 94
Magic Leap, a secretive U.S. startup that makes a $2,295 augmented-reality headset, filed a lawsuit Monday accusing one of its former engineers of stealing its technology to create his own AR device for China. Bloomberg reports: In a lawsuit filed Monday, Magic Leap alleges that Chi Xu, who left in 2016, exploited its confidential information to "quickly develop a prototype of lightweight, ergonomically designed, mixed reality glasses for use with smart phones and other devices that are strikingly similar" to the Florida-based startup's designs. The lawsuit marks the latest accusation from an American firm of intellectual property theft by Chinese companies, a perennial sore point that's helped escalate tensions between the world's two largest economies. With more than $2 billion in financing, Magic Leap is one of the better-funded startups delving into so-called augmented or mixed reality, a technology that gives users the illusion that fantastical, three-dimensional digital objects exist in the physical world.
Xu, who founded Beijing-based Hangzhou Tairuo Technology Co., also known as Nreal, unveiled his own augmented reality glasses at a major Las Vegas trade show in January, touting them as lighter than the Magic Leap One, Forbes has reported. Magic Leap released its headset last August after seven years of secretive work and more than $2 billion of investment. The startup alleges that Xu plotted during his roughly 13 months working there to launch his own competing company in China and "neglected his work duties" to acquire proprietary information. Xu is accused in the suit of breach of contract, fraud and unfair competition.
Xu, who founded Beijing-based Hangzhou Tairuo Technology Co., also known as Nreal, unveiled his own augmented reality glasses at a major Las Vegas trade show in January, touting them as lighter than the Magic Leap One, Forbes has reported. Magic Leap released its headset last August after seven years of secretive work and more than $2 billion of investment. The startup alleges that Xu plotted during his roughly 13 months working there to launch his own competing company in China and "neglected his work duties" to acquire proprietary information. Xu is accused in the suit of breach of contract, fraud and unfair competition.
Re: NOOOOOOOOO? Really? (Score:5, Insightful)
It all started with the idea that trading with China would open it up to becoming more liberal and democratic. It was an ..... unbelievably naive and shortsighted idea. It is hard to imagine the people who pushed it were mentally aged more than eight years old.
It might have worked, except that we were more interested in accessing an endless supply of cheap labor. This played directly into the Chinese government propaganda that any time they let the West in, we just want to rob them blind. Unfortunately they are not wrong. So rather than hooking the Chinese populace on the mystique of the freedoms and luxuries of the west, they saw yet another master with a heavier yoke, after all, they really do not like or respect their government and don't think it is very effective. The west was far more frightening, a shackle that could not easily be avoided.
If we could simply put the walls back up and cut ties, we could write it off as a failed experiment that we are not ready for yet. Unfortunately, we let it go on for decades, got our own selves hooked on slave labor, and simultaneously eroded our own manufacturing capacity to the point that we cannot possibly replace them (and orange furor has done very little to make this a reality).
Re: NOOOOOOOOO? Really? (Score:1)
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When you work for a company, well not all of them but good luck finding a company to work for that doesn't nowadays, you typically sign over the rights to anything you produce as a a result of your employment in your employment contract.
You may sign over the rights to them, but your experience in designing such devices is a marketable commodity, and provided you don't breach any patents obtained or copyright, then you are free to work for someone else on the similar concept. Contracts preventing continuation of an individuals trade are generally not enforceable.
Re: NOOOOOOOOO? Really? (Score:2, Insightful)
We also signed on to letting them ship their goods internationally for less than what it actually costs to do so. It costs more to ship things from the middle of the US to either of the coasts than it does to ship from China to the US (and the same holds true for most of Europe, the rest of North America, and many parts of South America and Africa).
Without that advantage, much of China's "cheap" labor would still not be enough to make it cost effective to make things there that need to be shipped out to ano
Re: NOOOOOOOOO? Really? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: NOOOOOOOOO? Really? (Score:1)
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It almost did work, Tianamen square was supposed to be the beginning of the end of the Chinese Communist Party. But due to many factors, some within the West's control and many outside, it didn't happen and instead those protesters were either arrested or massacred.
In hindsight, the whole thing was indeed naive. While the potential was there we now know that Chinese culture is too different from our own to make such predictions. We should have never opened relations with them and simply economically starved
Jian Yang!!!!! (Score:5, Funny)
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Glad *someone* posted that!
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Came for this reference and was not disappointed. Can't wait for the new season. Such an addictive show. I wonder if this sort of thing causes any companies to discriminate against Chinese job applicants.
Yet another case of a (Score:1, Insightful)
"secretive", "stealth mode" "tech startup" with no business plan and no product trying to blame "China" for ita failure.
my company defeats this attack (Score:1)
The fortune-500 company I work for defeats this attack by hiring East Indian contractors for almost all Dev work.
We hire 30 to 90 contractors per-project, they iterate for a year producing very little, and then IBM (I mean, the Fortune-500 company) fires them all.
We then test and discard everything they produced, and start over by hiring another 30-to-90 temps next budget cycle.
If we used China, we probably would have a product that was functional, but then we'd have competition. Can't have that.
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Matches my experience with that Fortune-500 company. Although I think the utterly incompetent and highly arrogant "engineers" I observed were from the UK. They were doing some big-data analysis and after 3 years and causing numerous production incidents, they still had no clue how much data they actually needed to capture for this. I know because they asked me when the customer threatened to terminate the project for non-performance. I had some other project working on the same data-stream, and I had those
It's not that he's Chinese (Score:5, Insightful)
As long as tribal boundaries exist outside of copyright protection law, there will be avenues of exploitation available, particularly to foreign nationals of countries who do not respect trademark infringement.
It's not that he's Chinese, in the same fashion that it's not always a pit bull when the story leads with Dog Mauls Neighbor's Kid.
But that's the percentage bet.
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Chineeesium!!!!!
It's also comeuppance. (Score:1)
America did the same thing ~150 years ago when it was bootstrapping its industry, and then Hollywood did it again to the east coast patent holders to get out from under Edison(?)'s patents on film equipment.
The point being that while it's definitely a problem from a legal and finacial perspective, our public consciousness of indignation is sorely misplaced since less than 3 generations ago we were doing that to each other, and 4-6 generations ago we were China doing it to European countries, particularly th
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Alternatively, maybe non-competes are bad and illegal anyway and when employees leave your can't wipe their minds of any relevant information they learned while working for you.
This happens all the time. Employee leaves, takes their knowledge and uses it to get their next job, build their next product. If you bothers you then pay more so they don't leave.
Proper Response (Score:1)
Jinyaaaaannnnnnnnggggg!!!
Duh.. (Score:1)
If Chinese nationalists don't steal trade secrets for China their fucking families back home will be imprisoned, tortured, or murdered. They don't have a choice.
China has a fucked up government. But oh noes... the Americans are 10x worse according to some folks.
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yea I would have just assumed that when I saw the name, my first thought was "well of course he's a shill." Keep in mind, they dont actually have to threaten your family to get this info. There are plenty of operatives, loyal to the PRC, who have taken upon themselves to learn enough about various engineering focus' that there is no shortage of agents who can set themselves up to get hired for these companies. Its classic james bond shit. I am not really sure that there is some overlord towering over a grou
Maybe do not hire cheap engineers from China? (Score:4, Insightful)
Sure, domestic ones seem more expensive, but that can turn out to be the other way round pretty fast.
My MagicLeap story (Score:5, Interesting)
TL;DR: I almost interviewed for them once
The recruiter was very enthusiastic, and truthfully, so was I. So I approved sending them my resume.
And I didn't hear back.
For three weeks.
I gave up on them, but the recruiter kept assuring me that this doesn't mean anything. I kept looking at other places, and was moving toward making a decision.
And then they called back. To begin with, the tone was... strange. It was "we know you're trying to reach a decision, but so you know, our process takes three interviews and take a while, so you (and, presumably, all my other potential employers) will have to accommodate that.
Oh well...
Then they asked me to sign an NDA as a condition to having the interviews. I'll remind you all that this is a product they have already launched. They were the only potential employer who asked for an NDA. Hmm...
So they send me a link to the NDA, and it contains restrictions on me telling people I am even interviewing for them, as well as a five years confidentiality agreement. I tried to negotiate this insane number, but they made it clear that the NDA was non-negotiable.
So I gave them a pass. And seeing this piece of news, I'm glad I did.
I'm sending this anonymously for obvious reasons. Ha! No I'm not. I am sending this under my real name because I did not sign any confidentiality agreements.
Shachar Shemesh
Re:My MagicLeap story (Score:5, Funny)
I worked there 13 months. Great time, lots of financial opportunities. Posting AC for obvious reasons.
Chi Xu
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Sounds like they are upset because they realized that their NDA isn't legally enforceable in many countries. Better only hire people from jurisdictions that respect your crazy T&Cs.
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Yeah, that's no way to retain top talent. Anyone who knows what they're doing and has a choice should shy away from such practices.
And it seems that Glassdoor agrees. At least from those reviews I've scanned, the more time people worked there, the less they are happy with the company.
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But think of what you missed out on! You could have learned what the magic leap actually is!
What, they announced their product? It was a shitty pair of expensive AR goggles? WHAT?
Hiring is a crazy process..been doing it for years (Score:2)
I have been a manager for many years, and have reviewed hundreds of resumes, and have hired or been involved in hiring at least 100 people.
Your comment about not hearing back from the recruiter for 3 weeks is pretty standard. Here's why...
1. You apply, through a job site, or the company site, or wherever.
2. It hits the recruiter's queue... The recruiter either
a. Forwards it on to the hiring manager
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First, the three weeks started after the recruiter has already passed on my CV to the company.
But the bottom line is that this doesn't matter. When I am looking for a job, there is a limit to how much it is reasonable to keep companies waiting. A company making an offer typically wants an answer within three days of making it, so they can offer it to someone else if I say "no". They are, usually, okay with postponing making the offer for a while, but not indefinitely.
If your hiring process takes eight month
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I agree 100%. We lost many good candidates because they accepted other offers while our process was crawling along. Something I forgot to mention was that once we found someone we wanted to hire, we had to compose the offer... then that offer had to go through an approval process. HR, Finance, etc. Zero we could do to speed that along.
The problem is, there is absolutely zero I can do about things out of my control as a hiring manager. I usually turned around initial resume response within 48 hours. Bu
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Couldn't agree more. A month, from CV reaching a company until a decision, is not unreasonable. Which means that 3 weeks to merely start the process is way too much.
I never said that was my main criteria, but performing the hiring within time constraint is a constraint I, myself, am subjected to. Otherwise, they might say "no" and I'll be left with no other options.
just ask marco rubio (Score:1)
oh, bloomberg.... (Score:1)
Damn communists! (Score:1)
Magically leaps into their Design (Score:1)
I see the future.... (Score:2)
...and it's one where non-US citizen Chinese aren't going to be allowed near any intellectual property.
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You don't let anyone look at your secret technology unless you can legally make them keep your secret. That they happen to be Chinese doesn't make any difference beyond the fact that it's one of the many places you might have difficulty enforcing your standard legal protections.
Am I the Only One... (Score:2)