Motorola Sues Huawei, Alleging Trade-Secret Theft
By CHRISTOPHER RHOADS
Motorola Inc. has sued Huawei Technologies Co., alleging that China's largest telecom equipment company stole its trade secrets.
In a complaint filed last week in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, Motorola said several of its former employees, most of them of Chinese descent, provided Huawei with detailed information on its latest cellular phone technology, including the company's "seamless mobility" initiative, over a period of years early in the 1990s.
Huawei wasn't immediately available to comment.
The filing is the first time that Schaumburg, Ill.-based Motorola has named Huawei in a complaint. But Motorola previously sued the group of employees and Lemko Corp., a technology company that is also based in Schaumburg where several of the former Motorola employees subsequently worked.
Motorola alleged in the latest complaint that one of the former employees, Shaowei Pan, reported directly to the founder and chairman of Huawei, Ren Zhengfei. Mr. Pan worked at Motorola for about 10 years until April 2004, according to the complaint, and then became chief technology officer of Lemko Corp.
The complaint alleges that Mr. Pan helped to establish Lemko with the idea of obtaining trade secrets from nearby Motorola, relying in part on former colleagues at Motorola who are also named in the complaint.
"All of the allegations are ridiculous and false," said Faye Vorick, vice president of marketing for Lemko and a defendant in the case. "Many of the people named in the complaint left Motorola years before becoming employed at Lemko. Beyond that, it's not our policy to comment on litigation."
Ms. Vorick, as a senior marketing manager, is accused of "playing a key role as the 'front' person for Lemko's wrongful activities."
She denied the allegations. "It is ridiculous," Ms. Vorick said. "I left Motorola several years before I came to Lemko, and all nondisclosure agreements were upheld and honored."
It isn't the first time Huawei has been charged with stealing trade secrets from a U.S. company. In 2003, Cisco Systems Inc. alleged that the company had stolen its router code, but it dropped the suit after Huawei agreed to remove its router products from the market and alter them. At a trade show in Chicago in 2004, a Huawei employee was caught after hours taking pictures of competing products.
Motorola is seeking damages and the return of its trade secrets. "Motorola will continue to vigorously protect its intellectual property," a Motorola spokeswoman said.
—Sara Silver and Loretta Chao contributed to this article.
Write to Christopher Rhoads at christopher.rhoads@wsj.com |
