According to a Reuters report, the US authorities on Monday accused a former Apple employee of stealing trade secrets and filed a criminal lawsuit in the US District Court in northern California. It is reported that the former Apple employee was sued. It is a Chinese name, Chinese name Zhang Xiaoliang (transliteration XiaoLiang Zhang).
Informed sources said that Zhang Xiaoliang resigned from Apple after returning to maternity leave in April this year, but he was suspected of stealing the trade secrets of Apple's driverless cars before leaving the company, and joining these technologies to join the domestic startup Xiaopeng. On Saturday (7 On the 7th, Zhang Xiaoliang booked the last flight of Hainan Airlines to Beijing, China, but was finally arrested by law enforcement officers of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) when passing the security checkpoint at San Jose Airport.
Zhang Xiaoliang may face up to 10 years in prison and a fine of 250,000 US dollars
In December 2015, Zhang Xiaoliang was hired by Apple to participate in the development of the 'Titan' project. This is Apple's rumored unmanned car project. Zhang Xiaoliang's team is responsible for designing and testing the board to analyze sensor data.
In April 2018, due to the birth of the child, Zhang Xiaoliang invited the family to visit the family. After the vacation, Zhang Xiaoliang told Apple that he would leave the country because his mother was sick. At the same time, he also told the boss that he would join the domestic startup. Company Xiaopeng Automobile.
According to documents from the Northern District Court of California, when Zhang Xiaoliang turned in two iPhones and his own laptop, Apple’s technical security team looked at the history of the device and found out that he was working during Apple’s network. Activities 'exponentially grow' and 'search and target a large amount of information from a variety of confidential databases'.
At the same time, Apple inquired about video surveillance and found that Zhang Xiaoliang had been to the company on Saturday night, April 28, and entered the Apple Automated Vehicle Software and Hardware Lab (this time is consistent with the data download time) and took it away. Some hardware. Later, Zhang Xiaoliang also transferred the downloaded data to his wife's computer.
When hired by Apple, Zhang Xiaoliang signed an intellectual property agreement and participated in a mandatory confidential training. At the end of June, Zhang Xiaoliang admitted that he had stolen the above information when he was interviewed by the FBI.
According to the lawsuit, Zhang Xiaoliang may face up to 10 years in prison and a fine of 250,000 US dollars due to allegedly stealing Apple's trade secrets.
Xiaopeng Automobile responds will actively cooperate with the investigation
Although products such as the iPhone have been exposed in advance in the past two years, most of them are revealed by third-party industry chain. The insiders are not too many to be investigated and prosecuted by the company, but the situation is serious when they are arrested by the legal department. More rare.
For today's news, many people speculate whether Xiaopeng will participate in the activities of acquiring trade secrets, and conspiracy theories are also emerging. In this regard, Xiaopeng Automobile has made official clarifications and announcements, and said that Zhang Xiaolang entered the service in early May. Signed an IP compliance document, and no records indicate that he reported any sensitive and irregularities to Xiaopeng.
Xiaopeng Automobile officially issued the following statement:
We are concerned about the news that on July 11 foreign media reported that Zhang Xiaolang, a former employee of Apple, was arrested and charged by the US Federal Bureau of Investigation for stealing trade secrets.
Xiaopeng Automobile attaches great importance to the protection of intellectual property rights and always regards compliance as the basic principle of all employees. Zhang Xiaolang signed the intellectual property compliance document on the day of his initial employment in May, and there is no record that he reported any sensitive and illegal to Xiaopeng Automobile. Situation. On June 27, we were informed of the investigation of Zhang Xiaolang by relevant local departments in the United States, and sealed Zhang Xiaolang's computer and office supplies as required. We will continue to actively cooperate with relevant adjustments on this matter and follow the handling of relevant local authorities. Method.
Prior to this, Xiaopeng did not understand the matter and did not participate in the matter in any form. Xiaopeng Automobile will keep paying attention to and cooperate with the matter, and strive to do related cooperation work. Thank you for your attention and understanding.
Xiaopeng Automobile Finance has nearly RMB 6 billion
According to the collection micro-network, Xiaopeng Automobile is a start-up company in the domestic automatic driving field. It was founded in Guangzhou in 2014. Its founder He Xiaopeng founded UC.
In May 2017, Xiaopeng Automobile won 2.2 billion yuan in the A round of financing. The excellent car industry fund initiated by Shenzhou UCAR Company led the investment. In December 2017, Xiaopeng Automobile announced the end of A0, A1, A2 three rounds. A+ round of financing, including: A0 round from Alibaba Group and He Xiaopeng himself; A round from Jiyuan Capital, Morningside Capital, IDG Capital, Jingwei Venture Capital, Shun Capital and Light Control Zhongying Capital Joint Investment; A2 Round from New Ding Capital, Kunzhong Capital and Lightspeed Venture Capital.
On January 29, 2018, Xiaopeng Automobile announced the launch of a total of 2.2 billion yuan of Series B financing in Hong Kong. It was jointly led by Alibaba Group, Foxconn and IDG Capital. After the financing was completed, Xiaopeng Automobile was able to obtain from the capital market. The funds have exceeded 5 billion yuan.
At the Boao Forum for Asia in early April, Xiaopeng Automobile founder He Xiaopeng said that the company will raise more than 10 billion yuan this year. At present, Xiaopeng Automobile has accumulated nearly 6 billion yuan in financing.
In addition, according to sources, Xiaopeng Automobile is seeking to raise US$600 million to US$700 million from Alibaba Group and other investors with a valuation of nearly US$4 billion. The fundraising will be through US dollars and RMB. The currency was completed. In response, Xiaopeng responded that it would not comment.
Xiaopeng Automobile hopes to realize the automatic driving of L4 in 2022, and combines the automatic driving of L4 with specific scenes to bring great changes to the business model of the enterprise. Xiaopeng Automobile co-founder and president Xia Wei was in April this year. It is expected that at the end of 2018, in early 2019, the company will deliver L3's automatic driving system in large quantities.
At present, Xiaopeng has a global R&D team of more than 600 people in the fields of automatic driving and intelligent network.
'Titan' is more than just a driverless car
Apple has long been known for its strict secrecy culture, and even media commented that 'Apple's everything is a secret'. And Apple's code-named 'Titan' project started in 2014, so far Time is kept secret.
In December 2016, Apple revealed in a letter to the US National Highway Safety Administration that they had a strong interest in driverless car systems, and that Apple’s 'unmanned drivers’ invested heavily and included drones. There are many excitements in many areas, including cars.'
In August 2017, Cook said in an interview with the media that Apple is developing an artificial intelligence system codenamed 'Titan'. This system is not just a driverless car. Cook said that 'Titan' is the secret of the company. Driving a car project and interest in an automated driving system suggests that this technology may not only be used in cars.
It is worth mentioning that this criminal lawsuit may also disclose to the world the investment of Apple in self-driving cars.
According to public legal documents, to access sensitive items like 'Titan', employees must log in to Apple's VPN Virtual Private Network and must be granted 'Information Disclosure' permission, and this status requires another employee to perform Double review. At present, about 3.7% of Apple's employees are more or less involved in the research of autonomous driving projects. The number of employees who know the project within the company has reached 5,000. Apple said that there are about 2700 among these employees. Name 'project core employee', which can access certain databases.
For the development of driverless car projects, Apple has received a license to test autonomous vehicles in California, and recently hired an executive from Waymo, the Google self-driving car division. Last November, Apple’s The autopilot research paper was first published on the online paper platform arXiv.