SANTA CRUZ — Santa Cruz-based company Joby Aviation has filed a lawsuit against competitor Archer Aviation Inc. and former Joby employee George Kivork, alleging corporate espionage.
Kivork, who served as Joby’s U.S. state and local policy lead for over four years, announced his resignation from the company in July after being offered a position at Archer Aviation, a competitor of Joby. In the lawsuit complaint, Joby accused Kivork of downloading dozens of highly confidential files only two days before announcing his resignation and sharing them with Archer. Joby also accused Kivork and Archer of using that confidential information to undercut an exclusive agreement Joby made with a real estate developer earlier this year. Joby is asking the court to award damages, and to prevent the further use of the allegedly stolen information by Archer.
“This is corporate espionage, planned and premeditated,” reads Joby’s complaint.
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Joby was founded in Santa Cruz County in 2009 and is still headquartered in Santa Cruz today. The company’s goal is to innovate electric vertical take-off and landing technology, which would allow aircraft to take off vertically, like a helicopter, and then transition to horizontal, airplane-like flight. The company has collaborated with NASA, has signed agreements with the Federal Aviation Administration to define safety standards, and has received airworthiness approval from the U.S. Air Force through a program designed to develop the commercial market around electric vertical take-off and landing.
Archer, headquartered in San Jose, was founded in 2018. The company also seeks to develop electric vertical take-off and landing technology, and is a major competitor of Joby.
Archer has been involved in legal battles in the past, as is noted in Joby’s complaint. One lawsuit, which was voluntarily dismissed by the plaintiff, accused Archer of misrepresenting its progress in technology to investors. Another came from aerospace manufacturer Wisk Aero, and accused Archer of theft of trade secrets and patent infringement. The two parties, along with Boeing, came to a settlement that names Wisk as the exclusive provider of Archer’s “autonomy technology” for future aircraft, according to a statement from Wisk.
Kivork began working at Joby in 2021. For his role at the company, Kivork represented Joby to governmental officials and executive employees from business partners. Before starting his job at Joby, Kivork signed a proprietary information and inventions agreement, agreeing not to share any confidential information from Joby and not to engage in any activity that would be competitive with Joby.
In 2025, Archer recruited Kivork. Before leaving the company, Kivork once again agreed not to share confidential information, and signed a letter confirming that he did not take any sensitive information from the company. However, in the complaint, Joby alleges that two days before announcing his resignation, Kivork downloaded confidential files containing business strategies, technical information about Joby aircraft and other sensitive information. He also allegedly added his personal email address as an “owner” of Joby files stored in Google Drive, which would allow him to access new information created after his employment with Joby was terminated.
Joby claims that Archer has already used that information to undercut an exclusive deal with a strategic partner. While working at Joby, Kivork played a role in the early stages of developing an exclusive agreement with a real estate developer. The agreement allowed Joby to design, build and operate skydecks at the developer’s properties. The agreement was exclusive — for 18 months, the developer would not make any similar arrangements in the same market.
However, just a few weeks before the partnership was to be publicly announced, and a few weeks after Kivork announced his resignation, Joby alleges that the developer told the company that Archer had approached them with an offer. Furthermore, in the company’s offer, Archer mentioned specific terms of the developer’s agreement with Joby that were highly confidential. According to the complaint, the developer believed the details of the agreement had come from Kivork. The developer terminated its agreement with Joby on the grounds that confidentiality had been breached.
After hearing this from the developer, Joby conducted a forensic investigation of Kivork’s old Joby devices and accounts, which it claims confirmed that he downloaded sensitive files and sent them to his personal email address, according to the complaint. Joby claims that, without access to these stolen files, Archer would have had to spend months creating an agreement with the developer from scratch. The information about Joby’s terms with the developer also allowed Archer to design their offer specifically to undermine Joby’s.
According to the complaint, Archer claimed to have conducted a forensic analysis of Kivork’s devices, but has not provided the results to Joby. Archer and Kivork denied any wrongdoing, according to the complaint, but Kivork has also threatened to delete the files rather than sending them back to Joby.
According to the complaint, Joby brought the lawsuit to stop Archer from using proprietary information any further, as such actions are “likely to irreparably damage Joby.” Joby is also asking the court to award damages based on the information that has already been used.
Against Kivork, Joby alleges breach of contract, breach of loyalty, breach of fiduciary duty and violation of California’s comprehensive computer data access and fraud act. Against Archer, Joby alleges inducement of breach of contract, aiding and abetting breach of fiduciary duty, aiding and abetting breach of duty of loyalty, and unfair competition. Against both parties, Joby alleges misappropriation of trade secrets, tortious interference with contract and tortious interference with prospective economic advantage. Joby is also demanding a trial by jury, where applicable.
A case management conference between Archer, Kivork and Joby, as well as a judge, is scheduled for March 2026. Joby declined to comment, and Archer did not respond to requests for comment.