Jury Finds Boeing Stole Technology From Electric Airplane Startup Zunum 46
A federal court jury in Seattle has ruled against Boeing in a lawsuit brought by failed electric airplane startup Zunum and awarded $81 million in damages -- which the judge has the option to triple. From a report: Zunum alleged that Boeing, while ostensibly investing seed money to get the startup off the ground, stole Zunum's technology and actively undermined its attempts to build a business. It accused Boeing of "a targeted and coordinated campaign" to gain access to
its "business plan, market and technological analysis, and other trade secrets and proprietary information," then using that to develop its own hybrid-electric plane design.
Zunum also accused Boeing of sabotaging its efforts to attract funding from aerospace suppliers Safran and United Technologies. The jury found that Boeing had misappropriated Zunum's trade secrets and breached its contract with the startup. It also found that Boeing's actions were "willful and malicious," which opens the door for the judge to award triple damages plus legal costs in a case that has already been running for more than four years.
Zunum also accused Boeing of sabotaging its efforts to attract funding from aerospace suppliers Safran and United Technologies. The jury found that Boeing had misappropriated Zunum's trade secrets and breached its contract with the startup. It also found that Boeing's actions were "willful and malicious," which opens the door for the judge to award triple damages plus legal costs in a case that has already been running for more than four years.
good job MBAs (Score:5, Insightful)
Good thing Boeing is run by MBAs and not by Engineers. How are those quarterly profits going?
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And then they proceeded to take that new technology, cut the budget for LocTite, and had the bolts fall out.
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On the business-side? Yes, clearly. They managed to scam a lot more of money out of the customer. That is apparently all that these types get taught today.
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Why would you steal anything from the worst idea ever?
That's what the steam engine companies said about Rudolf Diesel.
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Electric aircraft are real, exist, and are very cheap to operate. And believe it or not, operators kind of care about that "cheap to operate" thing. They also offer side benefits, like allowing operations in places where noise or pollution regulations would prevent other types of aircraft from operating.
There's no signs on the horizon of anything threatening combustion for long-haul air service. But for short hops - which are a real and sizable market - it's absolutely a viable prospect.
Re:Boeing is clearly dumb (Score:5, Informative)
Not really important to the topic at hand, but you know how electric cars can regenerative brake? Electric aircraft can regeneratively descend. :) Even if the plane were to run itself entirely out of power during its flight, it can still capture enough enough power on its descent for a powered landing with multiple go-around attempts.
I also should have mentioned that there's a continuum between pure electric and combustion-based aircraft. You also get designs for series-hybrid electric aircraft, which make use of the electric powertrain's low noise, low emission, and potentially STOL/VTOL capabilities on the ground (it's easier to add more props with electric than combustion) but produce electricity in the air from combustion. There's also hybrid jet aircraft, where electricity spins the compressor, allowing you to eliminate the the turbine, allowing for much more efficient engine designs. Even for aircraft that fully rely on fuel for flight, there's also electric ground systems that handle taxiing and internal loads while on the ground (jets burn a ton of fuel and make a lot of pollution while on the ground).
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Electric aircraft are real, exist, and are very cheap to operate
Sure, but they're called "drones" or "toys." There aren't any electric passenger aircraft currently doing any kind of regular operations I'm aware of.
Not really important to the topic at hand, but you know how electric cars can regenerative brake? Electric aircraft can regeneratively descend. :) Even if the plane were to run itself entirely out of power during its flight, it can still capture enough enough power on its descent for a powered landing with multiple go-around attempts.
This is just taking the piss. I mean, I won't deny that it's certainly possible to windmill the engines to charge batteries, but doing so is going to create insane amounts of drag, you will slow down VERY quickly, and then to avoid stalling you will have to descend at a rate that most passengers would likely find alarming. You'd only be able to generate tha
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Yeah, those can fly for all of 60 minutes including reserve power. 30 minutes(45 if you cut a third of the passengers) not including the reserve. So a bit over an 1/6th of the flight time of a normal DHC-2. Useful only for it's intended use case, that of 15-30 minute tourist flights, and fuck all else.
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Instead of being condescending, you could actually, you know, learn about the topic [wikipedia.org] before replying? Yes, they absolutely DO exist, a large number of them. Not "drones", not "toys". The largest that's flown has been an electric Grand Caravan 208B (14 seats), but there's development projects in the works for as large as 186 seats, and everything in-between. Scandinavian Airlines (SAS) has already started taking passenger bookings for flights on their their upco
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Harbour Air in Washington has been running them for years. As their planes reach the limit for a mandatory engine rebuild they're just replacing the gas engines with electric for about the same price.
This is an old article, can't find the updated one.
https://spectrum.ieee.org/firs... [ieee.org]
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I know that there's one airline about to start offering flights around now in the UK:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
ATR 72 aircraft seems like a good choice! (Score:2)
Nice link! The airline has settled on ATR 72 aircraft. Upon reading your wikipedia article reference, that seems like an excellent managerial decision.
Where I live, sometimes the local airport directs traffic to a certain runway, and with the help of flightradar24.com I've learned to identify most aircraft used by sound. I don't get up and look out the window because that's too much effort and I'm too slow anyway. I just open a new browser tab and click the flightradar24 bookmark to identify the aircraft I
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Oops, I meant to include this link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
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Oh, cool, the ATR fleet has been around for a long time, and these new 72-passenger ones are just extended-cabin versions of the smaller ATR42...the first one of those flew in 1984!
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There are three propeller aircraft that fly regularly enough over my house that I can identify them by sound. The ATR-72 [jetphotos.com], a DHC-8, [airhistory.net] and a DC-3. [dutchdakota.nl]
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Paying the legal costs was cheaper than buying the startup.
Ugh. (Score:5, Insightful)
The jury found that Boeing had misappropriated Zunum's trade secrets and breached its contract with the startup. It also found that Boeing's actions were "willful and malicious," which opens the door for the judge to award triple damages plus legal costs in a case that has already been running for more than four years.
Boeing is a cesspit of douchebaggery. Triple damages sounds about right, they deserve it.
Plus Reputation Damage? (Score:5, Funny)
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It is peanuts for them. Not even a light slap on the wrist. And the money will not negate the damage they did at all.
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It is peanuts for them. Not even a light slap on the wrist. And the money will not negate the damage they did at all.
Sure, but this sort of thing piles up when you have made douchebaggery your primary business model and the beating heart and soul of your company culture.
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It requires a gigantic pile though before anything really happens. Refer to Boeing, Microsoft, etc. for nice examples that you can be the most repulsive (and murderous in the case of Boeing, see the whistle-blowers that got suicided and the two crashed planes) scum and still stay in business. I don't think this regulation mechanism is nowhere near effective enough.
Can they do anything right? (Score:2)
facepalm...
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Even tripling damages, $250m is probably less than they would have had to pay to buy the company outright. But they still get the info.
electric airplane startup (Score:2)
Well, how else do you start up an airplane than by using electricity ?
Re: electric airplane startup (Score:3)
Pressurised air
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Compressed air. Shotgun shells (ever seen either of the Flight of the Phoenix movies?)
Re:electric airplane startup (Score:5, Interesting)
OK there was a British fighter jet in the 1950's that was started by a black powder cartridge.
It was the De Havilland Venom (similar to a Vampire but with a more powerful engine)
There is one still flying in New Zealand
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Re:electric airplane startup (Score:4, Informative)
Well, how else do you start up an airplane than by using electricity ?
Many ways. See Aircraft engine starting [wikipedia.org] (page describes about 18) including Air-start system [wikipedia.org]. Most commonly (I believe) for jet type engines is compressed-air start using either an onboard APU (Auxiliary Power Unit) or external "Huffer Cart" both described here How A Jet Engine Starts [boldmethod.com]. For planes with multiple engines, the APU/Cart is used to start the first engine, then bleed air from that engine is used to start the other engines.
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Push it down the runway and pop the clutch, obviously.
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Another engine https://www.thesr71blackbird.c... [thesr71blackbird.com]
The Other Side (Score:1, Offtopic)
Big oil has been successful in lobbying Texas GOP lawmakers in passing a tax of $400 on new and $200 yearly on only EVs. The reason they claim is to make of for lost gasoline taxes for road. The gasoline tax in Texas is $0.04 per gallon. The average ICE car owner pays less than $100/yr in taxes. My Tesla I have driven less than 2000 miles last year which equates to pay more than 10 cents per miles. Rather inequitable in my opinion,
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Was it necessary make this a Big Oil/Red State rant? I live in Oregon. We do the same thing [oregon.gov], except we have a sliding scale where higher efficiency fossil fuel vehicles pay more, with EVs paying the most.
Also, cry me a river about your registration fees when you can afford a friggen Tesla. My car cost less than half what yours did. \_()_/
Part of a pattern (Score:2)
Not the first time Boeing used unsavoury means to kill a competitor [wikipedia.org].
Here's hoping they go bankrupt (don't worry, someone else will swoop in to buy the business and hopefully run it in an ethical manner).
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Not the first time Boeing used unsavoury means to kill a competitor [wikipedia.org].
Here's hoping they go bankrupt (don't worry, someone else will swoop in to buy the business and hopefully run it in an ethical manner).
Not likely. Someone swooping in to buy the business will likely be tied up with vulture capitalists. They'll take the corpse and rape it repeatedly, make it seem animated for a bit to garner a shade more cash on the way out, then fuck it into the ground so hard it'll make the Max fiascos look like a toddler level fit. THAT'S the American way. Take great things and fuck them beyond repair while counting the money you make off the spectacle. INNOVATION!