Tech: Uber's self-driving car boss, Anthony Levandowski, is stepping aside amid legal fight with Waymo (GOOG, GOOGL)

Anthony Levandowski will no longer be head of Uber's Advanced Technologies GRoup.

Anthony Levandowski, the head of Uber's self-driving group, is stepping aside in face of accusations of theft from his former employer, Waymo.

In an email obtained by Business Insider, Levandowski said he will no longer be working on Lidar-related work at Uber, but he will remain at Uber and will retain his other responsibilities overseeing things like operations and security.

In his place, Eric Meyhofer is being named head of Uber's Advanced Technologies group, which oversees its self-driving car and trucking divisions.

Uber confirmed that Levandowski is no longer head of its Advanced Technologies Group, but declined to comment further.

Read Levandowski's full email to his employees below:

Team:

I want to let you know that Travis and I have decided that I will be recused from all LiDAR-related work and management at Uber, through the remainder of the Waymo litigation. This change means that Eric Meyhofer will be the head of ATG, reporting to Travis, and I will report to Eric. My other responsibilities will not change.

As you know, I currently don’t provide input on detailed LiDAR design choices. But making this organizational change means I will have absolutely no oversight over or input into our LiDAR work. Going forward, please make sure not to include me in meetings or email threads related to LiDAR, or ask me for advice on the topic.

We all know the hard work that Eric, James and the LiDAR team have put into independently developing our technology over the past few years.

We should all be proud that our self-driving technology has been built independently, from the ground up. With this move, I hope to keep the team focused on achieving the vision that brought us all here.

Thanks,

Anthony

Changing positions

Levandowski's recusal of any work involving Lidar is a direct result of a lawsuit brought by Waymo, the self-driving car spinout from Google. Levandowski formerly worked at Google on its self-driving cars, but left in January 2016 to create his own self-driving truck startup, called Otto. Eight months later, Uber acquired Otto and Levandowksi for $680 million.

Waymo now accuses Levandowski of downloading 14,000 files and bringing them to Uber to copy its Lidar designs. In February, Waymo sued Uber for intellectual property theft and patent infringement. Levandowski, despite not being named directly in the suit, has been a central figure of the litigation since he has taken the fifth amendment to avoid self-incrimination and not given Uber access to any of his files.

While Uber has repeated that Levandowski's work on Lidar has been minimal at best, his recusal from his position at head of the department is a defensive move for Uber to remove him from any involvement the technology at the heart of the matter. The ride-hailing giant faces a preliminary injunction hearing next week that could put a halt to Uber's autonomous vehicle research.

Developing...This post will be updated.

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