Novell Reaches Settlement With Workers Who Formed Wolf Mountain
NEW YORK -(Dow Jones)- Novell Inc., a developer of networking
software, Friday announced it has reached a settlement with three former
engineers the company accused of stealing software in a case dating back
to last May.
Orem, Utah-based Novell (NOVL) had accused Jeff Markey, Darren Major
and Larry Angus of stealing technology that some analysts consider the
company's secret weapon against rival Microsoft Corp.
The settlement calls for the dismissal of all claims filed between
the parties, a permanent injunction against use or disclosure of certain
trade secrets and payment of an undisclosed sum to Novell by the
ex-employees.
In February, a judge in Utah ruled the three took company trade
secrets with them when they left the networking company early last year.
The judge had told the men that they couldn't - for the next nine months
- develop software products based on the knowledge they gained while at
Novell. They were working on a technology called "clustering," an
alternative to networking that links several personal computers to act
like a mainframe.
The trio had formed a company called Wolf Mountain - which, as Novell
charged, was the code name for a Novell product the men were working to
develop. The judge concluded the men - who later changed their company
name to Timpanogos Research Group - intended to use Novell technology to
market a product in connection with Microsoft.
The issue, the judge had ruled, wasn't whether Timpanogos should be
allowed to compete with Novell. The problem, he said, was that when
Merkey and Major left Novell, they took a former Novell project, renamed
it and continued to work on it. Just days after leaving Novell, Merkey
met with Microsoft representatives in Redmond, Wash., to discuss
releasing a product that was identical to one Merkey had been working on
at Novell. Merkey not only disclosed confidential technical information
that belonged to Novell, but he also planned to pirate it in creating
his own product called "Tapestry," the ruling said.
Copyright (c) 1998 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. |
