Can someone explain this to me - It seems Uber met most of them while they were working with Google. Why did Levandowski form a company? Why couldn't Uber simply hire them off Google?
From my understanding they bought a functioning truck prototype, corresponding IP's AND the team.
2016-01-26 - Levandowski's last day at Google
2016-02-22 - iMessage chatter directly between Levandowski and Kalanick about poaching more Google employees
That certainly paints the "acquisition" of Ottomotto in August 2016 in a different light, no? It's also shown in the document that Levandowski was meeting with Kalanick and other Uber execs as early as June 2015, though it's harder to divine what was happening at that time.