{"id":37749,"date":"2026-08-11T02:49:13","date_gmt":"2026-08-10T21:49:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=37749"},"modified":"2026-08-11T02:49:13","modified_gmt":"2026-08-10T21:49:13","slug":"rippling-hits-back-at-nyc-ai-startups-trade-secret-lawsuit-in-messy-legal-battle","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=37749","title":{"rendered":"Rippling hits back at NYC AI startup&#8217;s trade secret lawsuit in messy legal battle"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><script>\r\n  atOptions = {\r\n    'key' : '644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6',\r\n    'format' : 'iframe',\r\n    'height' : 90,\r\n    'width' : 728,\r\n    'params' : {}\r\n  };\r\n<\/script>\r\n<script src=\"https:\/\/www.highperformanceformat.com\/644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<br \/>\n<br \/><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/nypost.com\/wp-content%2Fuploads%2Fsites%2F2%2F2026%2F08%2F137016969-1.jpg?quality%3D90%26strip%3Dall\" \/><\/p>\n<div>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/nypost.com\/2025\/04\/03\/business\/ex-rippling-employee-spied-on-firm-for-rival-was-asked-to-be-like-james-bond\/\">HR software giant Rippling<\/a> is hitting back at a lawsuit from NYC AI startup Runlayer, which accused the rival of stealing its trade secrets \u2013 alleging in a separate complaint that it was actually Runlayer who mimicked its patented technology.<\/p>\n<p>Runlayer\u2019s platform \u201cinfringes Rippling\u2019s patents, steals its intellectual property, and drafts off the substantial time and resources Rippling spent developing this technology over the past decade,\u201d states a complaint filed Monday in US District Court for Delaware.<\/p>\n<p>It accused Runlayer \u2013 which is backed by tech billionaire Vinod Khosla \u2013 of \u201cfree-riding\u201d off of its patented software technologies, \u201ccausing actual damages in the form of lost sales, lost customers, and price erosion.\u201d<\/p>\n<figure class=\"nyp-slideshow-modal-image wp-block-image aligncenter size-large\"><figcaption>Runlayer leadership team (left to right) Vitor Balocco, Tal Peretz and Andrew Berman. <span class=\"credit\">Runlayer<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>In separate court filings, Rippling also denied the claims in <a href=\"https:\/\/nypost.com\/2026\/07\/28\/business\/nyc-ai-startup-backed-by-tech-billionaire-khosla-sues-rippling-over-trade-secret-theft\/\">Runlayer\u2019s lawsuit last month<\/a>, which alleged Rippling stole the smaller firm\u2019s trade secrets to \u201cbuild essentially a clone\u201d of its safety and governance product during their commercial partnership.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt takes a certain boldness to accuse a competitor of violating intellectual property laws while infringing on that competitor\u2019s inventions. But that\u2019s exactly what Runlayer has done here,\u201d a spokesperson for Rippling told The Post.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"single__inline-module aligncenter wp-block-nypost-editor-primary-tag\">\n<\/aside>\n<p>\u201cHaving manufactured claims against Rippling to distract from its business failures, it now has to face a lawsuit for repeatedly copying Rippling\u2019s inventions in building its own products.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Runlayer responded that Rippling\u2019s lawsuit is simply retaliation and an attempt to distract from the original litigation.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThis is a desperate, retaliatory ploy to distract from the fact Rippling misappropriated our proprietary technology,\u201d Andrew Berman, CEO and co-founder of Runlayer, told The Post.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe clearly have a standout AI product that has nothing to do with these patents. No attempt to bully or distract will prevent us from protecting our IP and continuing to innovate and create the best product for our fast-growing customer base.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>In Runlayer\u2019s original complaint, it alleged talks with Rippling fell apart when the company refused to pay \u201ca market rate\u201d for its platform \u2013 while in the background, it was \u201csecretly building\u201d a copycat using Runlayer\u2019s confidential information.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"nyp-slideshow-modal-image wp-block-image aligncenter size-large\"><figcaption>HR software giant Rippling is hitting back at a lawsuit from NYC AI startup Runlayer. <span class=\"credit\">SOPA Images\/LightRocket via Getty Images<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Runlayer alleged it was tipped off on June 12 when an insider at Rippling texted Berman: \u201cThere\u2019s been a project internally to build essentially a clone o[f] Runlayer\u2026It\u2019s not feature complete by any means, but it\u2019s almost a 1 to 1 copy of Runlayer.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The suit specifically alleged Rippling is preparing to launch a competing a MCP Gateway that provides an extra governance layer that sits between AI models and their servers.<\/p>\n<p>But in a new court filing, Tim Fall, the alleged insider who texted Berman and an engineer at Rippling who has been with the company for one and a half years, said his messages were being misconstrued.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cNow that I have seen and used Rippling\u2019s MCP Gateway, it is clear to me that it is not a \u2018clone\u2019 and did not copy the Runlayer MCP Gateway. I would not make those statements knowing what I know now, as they are not correct,\u201d Fall wrote in his declaration.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"nyp-slideshow-modal-image wp-block-image aligncenter size-large\"><figcaption>Tech billionaire Vinod Khosla (above) is backing Runlayer, the NYC-based AI startup. <span class=\"credit\">REUTERS<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>\u201cI was disappointed to learn that Runlayer disclosed those messages in litigation without my knowledge or permission, and without ever contacting to [sic] me to understand what I meant when I sent them,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n<p>He said he does not recall receiving \u201cany source code, system architecture, or back-end details for the Runlayer MCP Gateway\u201d during the entirety of Rippling\u2019s relationship with Runlayer.<\/p>\n<p>A source familiar with the case told The Post that Rippling \u201cdid not invent anything in the MCP industry, so their arguments don\u2019t really work here. The patents simply don\u2019t apply.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>In an opposition filing last Friday, Rippling argued that with \u201cMr. Fall\u2019s imprecise text message debunked, Runlayer\u2019s case collapses.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cFirst, there is no evidence \u2013 none \u2013 that Runlayer shared trade secrets with Rippling,\u201d Rippling wrote in the filing. \u201cSecond, there is no evidence that Rippling used any Runlayer trade secrets.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<script async=\"async\" data-cfasync=\"false\" src=\"https:\/\/pl30214220.effectivecpmnetwork.com\/9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<div id=\"container-9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\"><\/div>\r\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>HR software giant Rippling is hitting back at a lawsuit from NYC AI startup Runlayer, which accused the rival of stealing its trade secrets \u2013 alleging in a separate complaint that it was actually Runlayer who mimicked its patented technology. Runlayer\u2019s platform \u201cinfringes Rippling\u2019s patents, steals its intellectual property, and drafts off the substantial time&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":37750,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/nypost.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2026\/08\/137016969-1.jpg?quality=75&strip=all&w=1200","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-37749","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news-hub"],"brizy_media":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37749","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=37749"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37749\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/37750"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=37749"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=37749"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=37749"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}