Scientist stole trade secrets from startup that wants to bring back extinct species: bombshell suit | Latest Tech News
Colossal Biosciences – a futuristic startup working to bring back extinct species including the woolly mammoth – is suing one of its former scientists for allegedly stealing trade secrets and sharing the data with competing labs.
In a bombshell lawsuit filed Friday morning in Texas federal court in Austin, Colossal accused James Kehler, previously its vice president of animal sciences and later of BioSynergy, of “dishonesty, greed, and the betrayal of the confidential science at the heart of Colossal’s mission.”
The Dallas-based firm – which has so far succeeded in creating “woolly mice” that bear woolly mammoth traits and grey wolves comparable to the extinct dire wolf – claimed Kehler breached three of the contracts he signed with the company after he left for rival labs.
Scientists at Colossal Biosciences create genetically engineered mice in an effort to revive woolly mammoths. Colossal Biosciences
Forensic analysis of Kehler’s Colossal work laptop computer discovered that prior to leaving the company, he moved recordsdata containing confidential data to a personal cloud account and a number of personal devices, the suit alleged.
Colossal is being represented by Alex Spiro, the hard-charging attorney at New York law firm Quinn Emanuel, according to court paperwork.
Kehler didn’t immediately reply to The Post’s request for remark.
As a vice president at Colossal, Kehler – who lives in Maryland – had access to the company’s most delicate scientific data, including data on its avian applications, like work on the dodo chicken and the moa, a large, wingless chicken previously discovered in New Zealand, according to the lawsuit.
Around April 14, 2026, after resigning from Colossal, Kehler joined Neion Bio – a competing lab – as Head of Avian Sciences and “used and disclosed Colossal trade secret and confidential information,” the suit alleged.
James Kehler (above) is accused of misappropriating trade secrets. Neion Bio
He has also been linked to Felix Pets, a startup that claims to use gene-editing technology to develop hypoallergenic cats – a course of that “depends on the same research and know-how underlying Colossal’s de-extinction work,” according to the suit.
Colossal is in search of damages, alleging Kehler “pivoted from scientist to thief.” The lab argued that the safeguarding of its proprietary data is key to its efforts to bring back extinct species whose ecosystems have been harmed without them.
It is at the moment working on the woolly mammoth; dodo; thylacine, a cat-like carnivore with large jaws also recognized as the Tasmanian tiger; and dire wolf, a 150-pound-plus creature with thicker legs, wider heads and broader shoulders than today’s wolves.
The startup raised $200 million in a January 2025 funding spherical led by TWG Global – the investment firm co-founded by Mark Walter and Thomas Tull – that hiked its valuation to $10.2 billion.
The startup raised $200 million in a January 2025 funding spherical. Colossal Biosciences
Notable traders embrace Peter Jackson and Fran Walsh, the Oscar-winning movie duo behind “The Lord of the Rings” and “The Hobbit,” and hedge fund supervisor Paul Tudor Jones.
Colossal has raised at least $435 million since it was based in 2021 by billionaire entrepreneur Ben Lamm and geneticist George Church, a professor at Harvard and MIT.
“Colossal’s trade secrets and confidential information are the core of its competitive advantage and its ability to achieve its de-extinction mission,” the company said in its criticism.
“The unauthorized use or disclosure of that information – particularly to a competitor – would allow others to replicate in days or weeks what took Colossal years to develop, and at a fraction of the cost. Such unauthorized use or disclosure would inflict severe and irreparable harm on Colossal and on the goals it exists to achieve.”
At its Dallas lab, Colossal said its scientists course of tissue samples from endangered animals, edit genomes and work to reprogram stem cells with the objective of undoing a large-scale loss of biodiversity, revive extinct species and protect endangered species.
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