Think of it as Waymo v. Uber, only nerdier.

Franklin Lakes, New Jersey-based medical device maker Becton, Dickinson and Co. has sued rival Cytek Biosciences Inc. and a group of nine former BD employees who joined Cytek, alleging they stole trade secrets. According to the complaint filed Tuesday in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, Cytek originally serviced BD flow cytometers—devices used to count certain types of cells. But after Cytek hired away a number of BD employees starting in 2015, the Fremont, California-based company launched its own flow cytometry devices.

According to the complaint, the former BD employees had access to “technical specifications, source code, and designs” and then downloaded ”thousands of confidential and valuable technical files” prior to leaving BD. BD claims it gave Cytek a list of storage devices the former employees were known to have used, but “the vast majority” of the devices have not been recovered.

“Cytek has not investigated and disclosed the extent to which it and its employees have or have shared confidential BD information, and how any such information has been used, forcing BD to file this case to safeguard its trade secrets and other valuable property,” wrote BD's lawyers at Ropes & Gray.

Cytek officials didn't immediately respond to a request for comment sent via an online contact form on the company website.

According to the complaint, individual defendant Ming Yan was the principal engineer and leader of a BD project to develop a new type of flow cytometer dubbed “Project Newton.” BD claims Yan left in January 2015 and joined Cytek after several other projects were prioritized over “Project Newton.” Yan allegedly downloaded 17,000 BD files to multiple portable storage devices before he left, the complaint says, but only one of those devices was located.

The complaint claims that within two-and-a-half years of Yan's arrival, Cytek launched its own device, and then just months later released a product bearing “striking similarities with the spectral flow cytometer previously in development at BD” during “Project Newton.” The complaint says that after a number of employees left BD for Cytek, BD conducted an internal investigation in January 2018 that indicated the former employees downloaded “thousands” of files to “dozens” of external storage devices, and only a “handful” were recovered.

“With its improper access to and misuse of BD's confidential information, Cytek was able to develop and launch its own spectral flow cytometry products rapidly, having never before produced a flow cytometer product itself, its only prior experience being in servicing and refurbishing others' flow cytometers, including BD's,” BD's lawyers wrote. “Cytek would not have been able to develop flow cytometers on as rapid a timeframe but for its wrongful use of BD's confidential information.”

Neither James Batchelder of Ropes & Gray nor BD spokesmen responded to messages Wednesday morning.