Even the world’s largest patent aggregator can end up in trade secret litigation!
Seattle-based Intellectual Ventures (“IV”) is famous for being a huge patent aggregator / non-practicing entity.
IV laid off multiple researchers when their project funding was drying up. Two of them went on to form a new company to try to commercialize a technology that they developed while at IV. They tried to attract customers and investors but were not successful.
In arbitration, the arbitrator awarded $6.5 million USD to IV for breach of confidentiality, trade secret misappropriation, and destruction of evidence.
The ex-employees filed a petition to vacate the arbitration award, but it appears to have been dismissed without a trial.
