SAN FRANCISCO — The former venture capitalist who lost a high-stakes sex discrimination case against Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers has demanded $2.7 million from the powerful venture firm to drop her appeal and to cover her colossal costs and fees during the three-year legal battle.

Ellen Pao’s demand, revealed in court documents Kleiner Perkins filed Friday with San Francisco Superior Court, is nearly three times what Kleiner has requested in reimbursement from Pao for its own legal expenses.

“We have no intention of accepting this unreasonable demand,” Christina Lee, spokeswoman for Kleiner, said in a written statement.

Through a spokeswoman, Pao declined to comment Friday. The protracted legal battle began in 2012 when Pao filed a lawsuit alleging gender discrimination and retaliation during her seven-year employment at the firm.

Felicia Medina, an attorney with Sanford Heisler Kimpel in San Francisco who has reviewed the court documents, said Pao’s request for $2.7 million “doesn’t undermine the sincerity” of her original goal with the lawsuit.

“She is on the defensive now, facing a defense costs bill,” Medina said. “If she incurred $2.7 million in fees and costs of her own, that is a huge amount of money, and she is entitled to try to minimize her losses.”

In March, a 12-member jury found in favor of Kleiner on each of Pao’s four claims. She sued for $16 million, but walked away with nothing. After the verdict, Pao said: “If I helped to level the playing field for women and minorities in venture capital then the battle was worth it.”

But last week, Pao filed a notice with the court to appeal her case. She has until mid-July to file her argument; that document would make the appeal official.

The latest back-and-forth suggests that the lawsuit, which rocked the small and insular venture capital world, and the larger tech industry it funds, isn’t going away quietly — keeping Kleiner in an uncomfortable spotlight.

“If I were KP I would want this whole thing to go away,” said Catherine Golden, a civil litigation attorney in San Francisco who has followed the case. “I would not want ‘women are buzz kill’ to ever raise its ugly head again.”

Pao alleged a male colleague had used that phrase to explain why she and other women were not invited to a dinner with clients.

But an appeal could set Pao up to pay nearly $1 million in court costs Kleiner incurred during the trial. The venture firm in April revealed it had paid $972,814 for court filing fees, transcribing and videotaping testimony, traveling expenses for witnesses and fees for expert witnesses. That figure doesn’t include fees for Kleiner’s legal team, led by Orrick attorney Lynne Hermle.

“Pao is obligated, as a matter of law, to repay a portion of our legal costs,” Lee said Friday. “We have offered to waive these costs as a good-faith attempt to bring this matter to a close.”

That offer is still on the table.

Pao’s attorneys have argued she is not responsible for Kleiner’s costs, pointing to a California Supreme Court decision, Loring Winn Williams v. Chino Valley Independent Fire District, in May that decided that plaintiffs whose cases fall under the Fair Employment and Housing Act, which includes discrimination lawsuits, are not required to pay the costs of the winning party. The exception is if a court finds the plaintiff’s case was frivolous or groundless.

Pao’s attorneys also argued that the sum of money Kleiner spent was outrageous — the venture firm shelled out more than $864,000 for expert witnesses, with one consulting firm, Cornerstone Research, billing for nearly $145,000, according to court documents.

Others agree.

“The KP expert fees are outrageous and ridiculous,” Golden said.

In the documents filed Friday, Kleiner rebuffed the Williams v. Chino Valley argument, saying that decision does not apply to Pao’s case, which falls under a different civil code. Kleiner also defended its trial expenses, saying in some cases the firm discounted its costs by half “to make sure the bill was as conservative as possible” when submitted to the court.

“Pao cannot have it both ways,” Kleiner argues. “She ran up KPCB’s costs by forcing KPCB to respond to an onslaught of allegations and discovery over the course of three years leading up to trial and is now objecting when she receives the bill. … Her unreasonableness is particularly nonsensical given her own post-trial demand for $2.7 million to cover her fees and costs.”

A hearing on the matter is scheduled for June 18.

Contact Heather Somerville at 510-208-6413. Follow her at Twitter.com/heathersomervil.