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Intel sued a former Oregon employee on Friday, alleging he took trade secrets with him when he fled to Microsoft and used the information to gain an advantage in subsequent business negotiations with Intel.
The engineer, Varun Gupta, worked for Intel for a decade before leaving for Microsoft in January 2020, according to the suit. He allegedly loaded Intel trade secrets onto two USB drives before leaving and then accessed them on his Microsoft-provided laptop.
Gupta could not be reached immediately for comment.
Intel and Microsoft are long-standing partners and, increasingly, rivals as Microsoft develops its own chip engineering capabilities. Microsoft is preparing to open a new engineering center in Hillsboro, near Intel’s research plants in Oregon, and has hired a former vice president of Intel to help run it.
In this case, however, the litigation indicates that Intel and Microsoft worked together to investigate the incident.
Intel’s complaint claims that Gupta denied knowing the location of one of the USB drives, but then handed it over to Microsoft for analysis. He claimed to have thrown a second USB drive that allegedly contained Intel secrets, according to the lawsuit.
The lawsuit claims that Microsoft determined that Gupta plugged the USB drives into his Microsoft-supplied laptop.
“In his new role at Microsoft, Gupta used the confidential information and trade secrets he stole from Intel, deploying them in one-on-one negotiations with Intel regarding custom product design and pricing. large volumes of Xeon processors, ”Intel said in Friday’s filing.
Intel’s complaint suggests that its marketing and engineering team were concerned that Gupta might have taken trade secrets while conducting business negotiations with him after he left Microsoft. An internal investigation concluded that he transferred 3,900 Intel documents to a USB drive on his last day at Intel, according to the complaint.
Intel is seeking damages not specified in the lawsuit, attorney fees, and an injunction preventing Gupta from using or disclosing the material on the USB drive. He filed the complaint Friday in US District Court in Portland.
“Intel has invested billions of dollars in the development of intellectual property essential to its success in some of the most competitive industries in the world,” Intel said in a statement written Monday. “We have great faith and confidence in our current and former employees, but we have an obligation to protect our intellectual property and other proprietary information, and we will not hesitate to act to prevent their misappropriation.”
– Mike Rogoway | [email protected] | Twitter: @rogoway | 503-294-7699
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