Colossal Biosciences Sues Former VP Over Alleged Trade Secret Theft
Colossal Biosciences sued former vice president James Kehler, alleging he took trade secrets to rival labs. What the suit claims and what is at stake.
Colossal Biosciences, the Dallas-based startup trying to bring back extinct animals such as the woolly mammoth, has sued a former senior scientist, accusing him of taking its trade secrets to competing labs. The suit was filed Friday in federal court in Austin, Texas, the New York Post reported.
The company is seeking damages from James Kehler, its former vice president of animal sciences. It claims he broke three contracts he had signed with Colossal after he left to work for rivals. Kehler did not immediately respond to the Post’s request for comment, and the claims have not been tested in court.
What Colossal says Kehler did
According to the complaint, a forensic review of Kehler’s company laptop found that before he left, he moved files holding confidential information to a personal cloud account and to several personal devices. As a vice president, he had access to some of the company’s most sensitive research, including data from its bird programs on the dodo and the moa, a large flightless bird that once lived in New Zealand.
The suit says that around April 14, 2026, after resigning, Kehler became head of avian sciences at Neion Bio, a competing lab, where he allegedly used and disclosed Colossal’s confidential information. The complaint also connects him to Felix Pets, a startup that says it uses gene editing to develop hypoallergenic cats. Colossal argues that work relies on the same research and know-how behind its own de-extinction programs. The Post also lists Kehler, who lives in Maryland, as later working at BioSynergy.
The complaint says Kehler “pivoted from scientist to thief.” Colossal is represented by Alex Spiro of the New York law firm Quinn Emanuel, according to court documents.
What’s at stake for the startup and its investors
Colossal’s value to investors rests largely on its research. In the complaint, the company says its trade secrets are the core of its competitive edge, and that a competitor using them could reproduce in days or weeks work that took Colossal years, at a fraction of the cost.
The company has attracted large sums for that research. It raised $200 million in a January 2025 round led by TWG Global, the investment firm co-founded by Mark Walter and Thomas Tull, which lifted its valuation to $10.2 billion. Colossal has raised at least $435 million since billionaire entrepreneur Ben Lamm and Harvard and MIT geneticist George Church founded it in 2021. Its backers include filmmakers Peter Jackson and Fran Walsh and hedge fund manager Paul Tudor Jones.
What Colossal is working on
The company says it has already produced “woolly mice” carrying traits of the woolly mammoth and gray wolves resembling the extinct dire wolf. Its current projects include the woolly mammoth, the dodo, the thylacine (a carnivore also called the Tasmanian tiger) and the dire wolf, which the Post describes as a 150-pound-plus animal with thicker legs and a wider head than modern wolves.
At its Dallas lab, Colossal says, scientists process tissue samples from endangered animals, edit genomes and work on reprogramming stem cells, with goals that include reviving extinct species and protecting endangered ones.
Source: New York Post
