Rippling cloned Runlayer after a year of trials—MCP IP theft or legit R&D?
mcp startup runlayer sued rippling for allegedly cloning its product after a year of trials. this highlights the risk for ai infra vendors selling to well-funded enterprise customers.
runlayer sued rippling for trade secret misappropriation, alleging the hr tech giant cloned its mcp gateway after a nearly year-long trial that included source code access and roadmap sharing. rippling denied the allegations, stating it is launching a superior product built solely on proprietary information, while runlayer retained sullivan & cromwell to challenge the launch. this dispute highlights the precarious position of ai infrastructure vendors like runlayer, which raised $42m from khosla and felicis, as they face enterprise customers capable of building similar tools in-house.