A former SandboxAQ executive filed a wrongful termination lawsuit last month filled with such outrageous allegations against the company’s famed CEO, Jack Hindari, that the plaintiff himself redacted the most salacious details.
On Friday, the company’s lawyers filed a blistering response, calling the former employee a “serial liar” and saying his lawsuit “makes false allegations for improper and extortionate purposes.”
Even the visible portions of the lawsuit — obtained by TechCrunch — contain eyebrow-raising claims if the court finds them valid. (A A copy of the lawsuit is available here.)
The case offers a rare look at how employee lawsuits can turn into a public display of dirty laundry from otherwise opaque internal events, thanks to the ubiquitous private arbitration clauses in Silicon Valley employee agreements.
The lawsuit was filed by Robert Bender in mid-December. Bender worked as Hidary’s Chief of Staff from August 2024 to July 2025, the complaint states. He claims in his lawsuit that he was wrongfully terminated after raising concerns about a series of alleged incidents, some of which he said involved “sexual encounters” and others he claims involved misleading financial information presented to investors.
For its part, SandboxAQ categorically denies the allegations. The firm’s attorney Orin Snyder, a noted partner at white-shoe law firm Gibson Dunn, tells TechCrunch: “This case is a complete fabrication. We look forward to debunking these baseless allegations and exposing the lawsuit — as described in our response — for what it is — an opportunistic and extortionate abuse of court.”
What makes the case particularly noteworthy is the number of Valley heavy hitters involved in SandboxAQ. The company is a quantum computing artificial intelligence startup that began as a moon unit of Google parent company Alphabet, with Google headed by Hidary. Hidary is also known in Silicon Valley as a board member of the X Prize.
Techcrunch event
San Francisco
|
13-15 October 2026
SandboxAQ was spun off from Alphabet into an independent company in March 2022 with Hidary as CEO and soon attracted big-name investors, including billionaire and former Google CEO Eric Schmidt, who invested and became the startup’s chairman. Other billionaire investors include Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff, venture capitalist Jim Breyer and Bridgewater hedge fund founder Ray Dalio.
Bender’s lawyers say other court document that the reworded sections “describe the sexual intercourse and physical condition of non-parties observed by Plaintiff during business trips.” In other words, the alleged incidents involve people Bender is not suing. This is an unusual move – usually, the objecting party is the one asking for corrections, not the person making the allegations.
There are various explanations for such a tactic, and TechCrunch was unable to ascertain what the motivations are in this case. Broadly speaking, the possibilities range from protecting innocent third parties not accused of wrongdoing, to a shakedown strategy — signaling that more damaging details could emerge if the defendants don’t offer an acceptable settlement.
The unredacted portion of the lawsuit provides some more general details about the allegations that were under wraps: Bender alleges that Hidari used company resources and investor funds to “solicit, transport and entertain female companions.” In an attached exhibit of a written message from Bender, he mentions prostitutes.
Bender further alleges in his lawsuit that Hidary sold tens of millions of dollars worth of his stock at a premium based on what Bender says was misleading information presented to potential investors. He claims in the lawsuit that the revenue figures presented to the board were 50% lower than figures shown in presentations to prospective investors.
SandboxAQ’s lawyers strongly dispute all of the above. “The Company made no fraudulent disclosures to investors in connection with its offering or otherwise. The CEO did not misappropriate company assets. Plaintiff concocted these inflammatory allegations to create legitimate claims and insulate himself from the consequences of his own misconduct.”
Bender, for his part, claims the company tried to blackmail him. His complaint asserts that he brought his lawsuit “only because his termination followed a malicious campaign to destroy his reputation.”
While the validity of any of these claims is for the jury to decide, many of his claims echo a SandboxAQ research report published by The Information in July.
Sources told The Information that Hidary was using company resources to fly women he dated on corporate jets and that the company’s revenue was far below its projections. Bender cites The Information story in his lawsuit, but denies being a source for it. SandboxAQ claims to be a source and lies about its involvement. (A copy of SandboxAQ’s full corporate response, including more allegations about the employee, can be found here.)
Despite any controversy, major investors were willing to invest in the company last year. In April, SandboxAQ raised over $450 million in a Series E funding round from Ray Dalio, Horizon Kinetics, BNP Paribas, Google and Nvidia.
SandboxAQ too announced a $90 million secondary sale. SandboxAQ has raised a total of $1 billion, he saysand is valued at $5.75 billion, according to PitchBook estimates.
