It seems that not even the highest corporate positions are secure from trade secret theft. Wired Magazine is reporting that the former Vice President of Hewlett Packard, Atul Malhotra, has been charged with violating IBM's trade secrets. Malhotra worked for IBM as the Director of Sales and Business Development for its printer division. During his time there, Malhotra allegedly took confidential documents, CC Calibration Metrics, that IBM had marked “IBM Confidential” on each page. Malhotra was told not to distribute the information by IBM's Global Services Pricing Coordinator.
In May 2006, Malhotra became the Vice President of HP's Image and Printing Services. Once in office, it is alleged that Malhotra sent emails to two Senior Vice Presidents of HP containing the CC Calibration Metrics, with subject lines that read “For Your Eyes Only.”
This case emphasizes the importance of taking deliberate legal steps to secure your company's trade secrets against employees. If you believe that a former employee has misappropriated your trade secrets, contact an expert in trade secret law for a factual evaluation.
When someone steals a trade secret from a company, is there a way to get the trade secret back quickly? It seems the longer the secret is out there, the more likely it will no longer be a secret.
Posted by: Theft of trade secret | 07/09/2008 at 01:19 PM