Uber walks away from Otto trademark

At the heart of Uber's litigation with Waymo is another oddly-named self-driving startup called Otto. That's the company founded by Uber engineer Anthony Levandowski right after he left Google, the job at which he was accused of illegally downloading more than 14,000 files. Levandowski sold Otto to Uber within a few months.

While the legal action between Uber and Waymo rages on, Uber is quietly ending another legal fight over the name "Otto" itself. Back in August, just after Uber's acquisition for $680 million, Otto was sued (PDF) by Clearpath Robotics, a large installed-robotics company with a headquarters in Kitchener, Ontario. Clearpath already had a division called OTTO Motors, which manufactured OTTO, described as "the first self-driving warehouse robot."

The Clearpath Robotics lawsuit shows an Otto truck adjacent to an Otto warehouse robot. Following the acquisition of Levandowski's Otto by the world's most famous start-up, Clearpath executives started getting customer inquiries and press calls that were clearly meant for Uber.

In the complaint, Clearpath says it filed for US trademark protection on Feb. 19, 2016, and that the application claims priority from a Canadian application filed on September 18, 2015. Both of those applications precede Otto's application filed in March 2016.

The lawsuit was apparently settled and dismissed in February, just a few weeks before Waymo sued Uber. A report by Forbes says that Uber stated in April, without explanation, that it would "retire the Otto name." The ot.to website now redirects to Uber's Advanced Technologies Group, or ATG. Otto also informed the California Department of Motor Vehicles that it would be changing its name. Clearpath's Otto Motors division, meanwhile, confirmed to Forbes that it will keep calling itself Otto. Uber is retaining the legal name "Ottomotto LLC" for freight-carrier operations.

Given how things are going in its lawsuit against Waymo, in which Uber could be held liable if used trade secrets acquired by Levandowski, it's no surprise that the self-driving car company wanted to quietly end a dispute over the name. Those following the Waymo v. Uber litigation will continue to hear about Otto in news reports, but you won't see "Otto"-branded trucks on the road.

Separately, California DMV officials will be inspecting Uber's truck facility in San Francisco to make sure the company was not testing driverless trucks on California roads without permission, Forbes reported today. Uber has said it uses only "driver-assist tech" in California, although it does test self-driving trucks in Colorado.

"We keep the CA DMV abreast of our activities and have had multiple discussions with them regarding our operations," an Uber spokesperson told Forbes.