Eric A. Tate

Tate likes to say his practice spans multiple industries. As co-chair of Morrison & Foerster's global employment and labor group, his practice has grown into employment information technology. He spends the bulk of his time doing trade secrets and mobility work, representing both companies that say they lost trade secrets and companies accused of taking them.

Last year, Tate was involved in what was seen as the trade secrets case of the century, defending Uber Technologies Inc. from Alphabet Inc.-owned Google's Waymo LLC over autonomous vehicles.

Waymo and its attorneys at Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan sought $1.6 billion from the ride share startup and an injunction that would have imperiled the company's presence in the self-driving car market.

A massive amount of discovery was conducted and evidence collected. . Waymo LLC v. Uber Technologies Inc. et al., 17-CV00939 (N.D. Cal., filed Feb. 23, 2017).

But Tate was able to knock down Waymo's unfair competition cause of action, reducing the potential exposure period by one year. Then four days into trial, Uber settled the case, giving Waymo equity stake in the company of .34%, worth about $244.8 million.

Observers said it was also a win for Uber in that the end of the trial stopped any damaging revelations about Uber's then-CEO Travis Kalanick.

Proceeding to trial could have further risked Uber making admissions of guilt about the theft of trade secrets.

Now, the race for bringing autonomous vehicles to the masses carries on.

"This was the first and biggest skirmish in the autonomous vehicle industry, and one of the most watched trade secret cases of the century," said Tate. "It was a reminder that the Silicon Valley remains at the forefront of technological innovation, and the role that the law can play in shaping developments that change our society."

-- Justin Kloczko