Altitude adjustment
Judge rejects Wisk move in air fight with Archer
A federal judge in San Francisco has rejected airtaxi startup Wisk Aero’s request for a preliminary injunction against rival Archer Aviation, the latest development in a bizarre legal dogfight between the two deep-pocketed startups.
Wisk Aero, backed by Boeing and Google cofounder Larry Page’s company Kitty Hawk, wanted to keep its rival Archer from using any of the trade secrets it alleges were stolen.
In his ruling filed on Thursday, US District Court Judge William Orrick wrote that “Wisk has not shown a likelihood of success on the merits that defendant Archer Aviation Inc. has misappropriated its particular asserted trade secrets.”
However, the judge also acknowledged that there were “some arguable indications of misappropriation.”
Archer took the opportunity to blast Wisk.
“The record makes it clear that Wisk has provided no evidence — not a single document, not a single witness — that Archer ever received or used any Wisk trade secret,” Archer’s deputy general counsel Eric Lentell said in a statement.
“Wisk’s charges of massive theft are based entirely on conspiracy theories and outright misrepresentations of the actual record,” he added.
Despite the legal hit, Wisk said it intends to take the case to trial.
“We are in the very early stages of a long legal process, with in-depth evidence-gathering now to begin, and we fully intend to hold Archer accountable at trial,” the company said in a statement.
Wisk first sued Archer this spring for allegedly ripping off its electricpowered airplane design after it hired away several of the company’s engineers in December 2019 and January 2020.
But last month, Archer — whose investors include United Airlines and the auto giant that controls Fiat-Chrysler and Ferrari, as well as Alex Rodriguez and Jennifer Lopez — argued that Wisk in fact stole the designs at the center of the case.
Both companies’ blueprints show plans for a nearly identical aircraft using a “12-tilt-6” design.