Palantir Sues Ex-Engineers Over Plans to Launch ‘Copycat’ AI Startup

Palantir Applied sciences has filed a federal lawsuit in opposition to two former senior engineers, alleging they used stolen commerce secrets and techniques to create a “copycat” AI integration firm that competes straight with the information analytics large’s core enterprise.

The court docket casefiled Thursday in Manhattan federal court docket, seeks to cease Radha Jain and Joanna Cohen from persevering with a “months-long charade of deceit and unfair competitors” as Palantir claims they breached contractual obligations by constructing Percepta, an AI transformation startup owned by enterprise capital large Basic Catalyst.

The grievance alleges that the engineers had been entrusted with Palantir’s “crown jewels,” together with its supply code, inner healthcare demonstration workspaces, applied buyer workflows, and proprietary buyer engagement methods representing billions of {dollars} in investments.

Jain, who helped design Palantir’s flagship AIP Logic, resigned in November 2024, and Cohen, a healthcare chief who constructed AI options for main shoppers, left in February.

Each allegedly saved their new employers secret, refused to signal separation agreements and left their LinkedIn profiles unchanged for months, the lawsuit mentioned.

Palantir claims that Cohen despatched herself extremely confidential Palantir paperwork by way of Slack the day after the discover, together with a healthcare income cycle diagram, an inner demo framework, and a draft work assertion, and later accessed them on her private cellphone.

“They lied about their plans after they resigned, Cohen stole Palantir’s confidential paperwork and knowledge on her manner out, they usually each hid their aggressive misconduct for months,” the submitting states.

Percepta emerged from stealth mode in October, with a enterprise mannequin that mirrors Palantir’s and a group made up of almost half of former Palantir staff, together with co-founder Hirsh Jain.

Throughout a Forbes interviewBasic Catalyst CEO Hemant Taneja acknowledged Palantir’s worth and mentioned his firm was creating “a model” of Palantir’s enterprise.

The lawsuit warns that the stolen paperwork within the fingers of a competitor might be used to “shortcut greater than a decade of Palantir’s investigation” and “evade tens of millions of {dollars} in capital prices.”

Palantir claims Percepta may “replicate its handiest demonstrations” and use stolen insights to win clients, “irreparably harming” its market place.

The defendants acquired “tens of millions of {dollars} in compensation” in alternate for non-compete agreements banning them from competing for 12 months, 24-month non-solicitation agreements and confidentiality obligations, the corporate alleges.

Palantir just lately entered right into a contract with the US Military value as much as $10 billion over the following decade and gained a $30 million contract to construct ImmigrationOS for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

At The Data’s WTF Summit on Wednesday, Lisa Gordon, head of worldwide communications at Palantir, mentioned the corporate’s shift towards the Trump administration is “regarding.”

“I feel it may be a problem as a whole lot of the corporate is shifting pro-Trum, shifting in a sure course,” Gordon mentioned, stopping mid-speak, in accordance with a CNBC report. report.

Palantir, valued at $461.54 billion Following a 374.87% enhance in market capitalization, requests emergency measures, reimbursement of authorized charges and an extension of non-compete durations to cowl the alleged violation.

Hirsh Jain and Basic Catalyst didn’t instantly reply Declutter requests for feedback.