Colossal Biosciences – a futuristic startup working to bring back extinct species including the woolly mammoth – is suing one of its former top 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, formerly 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 gray wolves similar to the extinct dire wolf – claimed Kehler breached three of the contracts he signed with the company after he left for rival labs.
Forensic analysis of Kehler’s Colossal work laptop found that prior to leaving the company, he moved files containing confidential information to a personal cloud account and multiple 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 documents.
Kehler did not immediately respond to The Post’s request for comment.
As a vice president at Colossal, Kehler – who lives in Maryland – had access to the company’s most sensitive scientific information, including data on its avian programs, like work on the dodo bird and the moa, a large, wingless bird formerly found 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.
He has also been linked to Felix Pets, a startup that claims to use gene-editing technology to develop hypoallergenic cats – a process that “depends on the same research and know-how underlying Colossal’s de-extinction work,” according to the suit.
Colossal is seeking damages, alleging Kehler “pivoted from scientist to thief.” The lab argued that the safeguarding of its proprietary info is key to its efforts to bring back extinct species whose ecosystems have been harmed without them.
It is currently working on the woolly mammoth; dodo; thylacine, a cat-like carnivore with massive jaws also known 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 round led by TWG Global – the investment firm co-founded by Mark Walter and Thomas Tull – that hiked its valuation to $10.2 billion.
Notable investors include Peter Jackson and Fran Walsh, the Oscar-winning film duo behind “The Lord of the Rings” and “The Hobbit,” and hedge fund manager Paul Tudor Jones.
Colossal has raised at least $435 million since it was founded 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 complaint.
“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 process tissue samples from endangered animals, edit genomes and work to reprogram stem cells with the goal of undoing a large-scale loss of biodiversity, revive extinct species and preserve endangered species.
