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No. 3:17-cv-00939-WHA

WAYMO’S OPPOSITION TO DEFENDANTS’ MOTION TO STRIKE

QUINN EMANUEL URQUHART & SULLIVAN, LLP

 Charles K. Verhoeven (Bar No. 170151)

 charlesverhoeven@quinnemanuel.com

 David A. Perlson (Bar No. 209502)

 davidperlson@quinnemanuel.com

 Melissa J. Baily (Bar No. 237649)

 melissabaily@quinnemanuel.com

 John Neukom (Bar No. 275887)

 johnneukom@quinnemanuel.com

 Jordan Jaffe (Bar No. 254886)

 jordanjaffe@quinnemanuel.com

50 California Street, 22nd Floor

San Francisco, California 94111-4788

Telephone: (415) 875-6600

Facsimile: (415) 875-6700

Attorneys for WAYMO LLC

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT

NORTHERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA 

SAN FRANCISCO DIVISION

WAYMO LLC,

Plaintiff,

v.

UBER TECHNOLOGIES, INC.; 

OTTOMOTTO LLC; OTTO TRUCKING 

LLC,

Defendants.

CASE NO. 3:17-cv-00939-WHA

WAYMO’S OPPOSITION TO 

DEFENDANTS’ MOTION TO STRIKE 

(DKT. 529)

Case 3:17-cv-00939-WHA Document 630 Filed 06/14/17 Page 1 of 3
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-1- No. 3:17-cv-00939-WHA

WAYMO’S OPPOSITION TO DEFENDANTS’ MOTION TO STRIKE

Defendants seek to strike Waymo’s Opposition (Dkt. 526) to Defendants’ Administrative 

Motion to File Under Seal Acquisition Documents (Dkt. 515), which sought to file under seal, in 

their entirety, several documents regarding Uber’s acquisition of Otto (“Acquisition Documents”). 

Defendants reason that Waymo’s Opposition should be stricken because, according to Defendants, 

Waymo was not even allowed to oppose Defendants’ Administrative Motion to Seal without first 

following the procedures for challenging designations under the Protective Order.1 Dkt. 529 at 1. 

Defendants’ Motion to Strike is a baseless waste of Court resources, and a transparent attempt to 

further hide from the public documents and information it does not like. 

Initially, as Waymo pointed out its Opposition, Defendants filed the Acquisition 

Documents under seal in their entirety even though they did not designate these same documents 

under the Protective Order in their entirety when producing them to Waymo. Dkt. 526 at 1. This 

Court recently denied Defendants’ attempt to file a document entirely under seal even though they 

had previously designated only portions of the document. See Dkt. 550 at 2-3. The same rule 

should control here. Defendants do not dispute that they previously asserted confidentiality only 

over select portions of the Acquisition Documents. Instead, Defendants contend the Court stated 

Defendants could file the Acquisition Documents “under the protective order.” Dkt. 529 at 1 n.1. 

But Defendants produced the Acquisition Documents to Waymo without designating the entire 

documents “under the protective order.” So this is no explanation at all. It also shows that 

Defendants’ contention that the procedure for challenging designations under the Protective Order 

has any relevance to this issue does not pass the straight face test.

Waymo also argued in its Opposition that it was improper for Defendants to seek to seal 

certain closing conditions described in the Acquisition Documents. Here too, Defendants offer no 

substantive response to justify their request to seal these portions of the Acquisition Documents. 

Instead, Defendants merely state they will later serve a motion showing Waymo to be wrong on 

the merits. Dkt. 529 at 1. 

 

1

 Notably, while Defendants contend Waymo did not follow the proper procedures in this 

Court’s Orders in its Opposition, Defendants do not follow the proper procedures in filing a 

motion under Civil L.R. 7-4, such as by failing to notice a hearing date, among other deficiencies. 

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-2- No. 3:17-cv-00939-WHA

WAYMO’S OPPOSITION TO DEFENDANTS’ MOTION TO STRIKE

In any event, Defendants’ suggestion that Waymo is not allowed to oppose Defendants’ 

motion to seal these portions of the Acquisition Documents without first engaging in a weeks-long 

process under the protective order makes no sense. Parties are given only four days to oppose an 

administrative motion to file under seal. Civil L.R. 7-11(b). A party cannot seek judicial 

intervention regarding a PO challenge until 14 days after the meet-and-confer process has reached 

impasse, and so Defendants’ position would nullify the rule. Further, the protective order does not 

preclude a party from opposing an administrative motion to file under seal. 

While the protective order permits challenges at any time to any produced material 

designated as confidential, to do so generally for everything produced is an inefficient use of time. 

Here, however, Defendants’ latest of several attempts to improperly shield themselves from public 

disclosure warranted an opposition, which Waymo filed. As this Court has previously recognized, 

Defendants may not shield facts from the public merely because their disclosure may 

inconvenience them. Dkt. 127, 3/29 Hr’g Tr. at 18:6-12 (“MR. GONZÁLEZ: Your Honor, the 

reason why we wanted it in chambers is because of the adverse impact that we think it would have 

on our client. If there’s a headline tomorrow saying this guy is asserting the Fifth Amendment --

THE COURT: Listen, please don’t do this to me again. There’s going to be a lot of adverse 

headlines in this case on both sides. And I can’t stop that.”); id. at 10:20-25 (“I’m not going to get 

diverted off into you coming in here with -- with no motion whatsoever, nothing, and trying to get 

special pleading because you represent somebody big, and get an under-seal hearing so the public 

can’t hear it. That’s not going to work.”). It should do so again.

For the foregoing reasons, Plaintiff respectfully requests that the Court deny Defendants’ 

Motion to Strike in all respects. 

DATED: June 14, 2017 QUINN EMANUEL URQUHART & SULLIVAN, 

LLP

By /s/Charles K. Verhoeven

Charles K. Verhoeven

Attorneys for WAYMO LLC

Case 3:17-cv-00939-WHA Document 630 Filed 06/14/17 Page 3 of 3