More Uber woes: Executive resigns, investor sues ousted CEO

Uber CEO Travis Kalanick attends the summer World Economic Forum in Tianjin, China on June 26, 2016. (REUTERS/Shu Zhang/File Photo)

DETROIT, USA: Uber Technologies Inc. faced a fresh round of turmoil Thursday, with its global operations chief resigning and a major investor suing the ride-hailing company鈥檚 former CEO.
Ryan Graves told Uber staff in an e-mail Thursday that he will transition out of his role as senior vice president of global operations in mid-September. Graves will remain on Uber鈥檚 board.
That board 鈥� and its support for former CEO Travis Kalanick 鈥� was the subject of a lawsuit filed Thursday in Delaware Chancery Court by Benchmark Capital Partners.
Benchmark is a major investor with 13 percent of Uber鈥檚 stock. It claims Kalanick is trying to pack Uber鈥檚 board with his allies and eventually return to his post as CEO. The venture capital firm says that would harm Uber鈥檚 shareholders, employees, drivers and customers.
A spokesperson for Kalanick said the lawsuit is 鈥渃ompletely without merit and riddled with lies and false allegations.鈥�
In the lawsuit, Benchmark claims Kalanick concealed material information from investors when he created three new board seats in 2016 and gave himself the right to appoint people to those seats. Among other things, Benchmark said, Kalanick knew Uber might be accused of stealing trade secrets from Waymo, Google鈥檚 self-driving car unit. Waymo sued Uber earlier this year.
The lawsuit also says Kalanick didn鈥檛 discuss his failure to curb Uber鈥檚 pervasive culture of discrimination and sexual harassment.
Kalanick resigned under pressure in June after a monthslong investigation into harassment and other behavior problems at the San Francisco-based company. But he quickly appointed himself to one of the three board seats. The other two remain vacant.
Benchmark says Kalanick has acquired 鈥渁 disproportionate level of influence over the board, ensuring that he would continue to have an outsized role in Uber鈥檚 strategic direction even if forced to resign as CEO.鈥� The firm says Kalanick has already interfered in the board鈥檚 attempts to hire a new CEO.
Benchmark wants to remove the three additional seats and return the board to eight members. It鈥檚 also asking the court to prevent Kalanick from participating in board meetings.
Uber said it had no comment on the lawsuit. But in a statement, Kalanick鈥檚 spokesperson said the lawsuit is an attempt to deprive Kalanick of his rights as an Uber founder and shareholder.
鈥淭ravis will continue to act in the interests of Uber and all of its stakeholders and is confident that these entirely baseless claims will be rejected,鈥� the statement said.