Background
Joby Aero and Archer Aviation are two of the leading competitors in the electric vertical takeoff and landing (eVTOL) aircraft industry — the sector building “flying taxis” that could one day provide on-demand urban air mobility. Both companies draw from the same small pool of specialized aerospace engineers, and both have raced to secure the urban infrastructure — vertiports, rooftop landing pads, and exclusive real estate partnerships — that will be essential to running a commercial air taxi service.
In November 2025, Joby filed a trade secret lawsuit in California state court (later removed to federal court) alleging that George Kivork, a former Joby executive, downloaded confidential files before leaving to join Archer. The most consequential alleged theft was a confidential agreement Joby had negotiated with a real estate developer for exclusive access to key urban landing sites. Joby alleged that Archer then used the stolen terms to approach the same developer and undercut Joby’s exclusive deal — potentially costing Joby a critical first-mover advantage in urban air mobility infrastructure.
Archer denied the allegations and filed counterclaims alleging that Joby had concealed ties to Chinese suppliers and misclassified aircraft components on import documentation.
The Court’s Holding
In a June 5, 2026 order, Magistrate Judge Susan Van Keulen issued a mixed ruling on the parties’ motions to dismiss.
Joby’s trade secret claims: The court allowed Joby’s core Defend Trade Secrets Act (DTSA) claim to proceed — specifically, the allegation that Kivork misappropriated the confidential real estate developer agreement and that Archer used it to compete unfairly. However, Judge Van Keulen dismissed several other Joby trade secret claims covering commercial strategy documents, regulatory planning materials, infrastructure planning information, and technical aircraft specifications, finding that Joby had not sufficiently identified those categories of information as protectable trade secrets with adequate specificity. Joby was granted leave to amend those dismissed claims by June 22, 2026.
Archer’s counterclaims: All of Archer’s counterclaims were dismissed in their entirety as “impermissible shotgun pleadings” — complaints that aggregate multiple allegations without connecting specific facts to specific legal claims, making it impossible for the opposing party to understand what it must defend. The court also found that Archer’s fraud-based counterclaims failed the heightened pleading standard that applies to fraud allegations. Archer was granted leave to refile amended counterclaims by June 29, 2026.
Key Takeaways
- Joby’s core DTSA claim — misappropriation of a confidential real estate exclusivity agreement — survived dismissal and will move forward, keeping the most commercially significant allegation alive.
- Broader trade secret claims (strategy documents, technical specs) were dismissed for lack of specificity, reinforcing that DTSA plaintiffs must precisely identify the information they allege was stolen, not just plead general categories.
- Archer’s counterclaims were dismissed as shotgun pleadings — a useful reminder that courts require counterclaims to connect specific facts to specific legal theories with enough precision for the opposing party to respond.
- The eVTOL sector’s race to secure exclusive urban landing infrastructure is now a live legal battleground, with real estate strategy emerging as a protectable trade secret in its own right.
Why It Matters
The eVTOL industry is at an inflection point: the companies that lock up premium urban landing sites before competitors will have a durable structural advantage when commercial air taxi service launches. Joby’s lawsuit signals that it views its real estate strategy — the specific terms it negotiated to secure exclusivity — as intellectual property worth protecting as vigorously as its aircraft designs. The court’s decision to let that claim proceed validates the theory that a confidential business agreement about physical infrastructure can constitute a protectable trade secret under the DTSA.
More broadly, the ruling offers a template for trade secret plaintiffs and defendants in the eVTOL space and beyond. For plaintiffs: specificity is non-negotiable; general allegations about “strategy documents” or “technical information” will not survive a motion to dismiss. For defendants filing counterclaims: shotgun pleadings invite dismissal and delay, and fraud theories require particularly precise fact allegations.
Case surfaced via GovInfo federal court records and reported by Aviation Week and AVweb.