| Work Detail |
Offshore cable maker Prysmian has won its trade secrets case against its India-based competitor Sterlite Technologies and the Italian firm’s former executive Stephen Szymanski.
A South Carolina jury found in favour of Prysmian following a three-week jury trial in the US District Court in Columbia, South Carolina.
The jury found that Sterlite was ‘unjustly enriched’ by taking Prysmian’s trade secrets and awarded $96.5m in damages to the Italian company.
The jury also found that Szymanski revealed Prysmian’s trade secrets and fined him $200,000. Szymanski ran Prysmian’s optical fiber cable business in North America, and departed Prysmian for Sterlite, a direct competitor, in August 2020.
Prysmian filed its lawsuit in June 2021, accusing its former executive of misappropriating trade secrets and taking them to his new employer Sterlite, a direct competitor. Sterlite and Szymanski denied that they had taken anything from Prysmian.
At trial, Prysmian ultimately proved that Sterlite had taken thousands and thousands of pages of Prysmian’s confidential information and trade secrets. The materials in Sterlite’s possession included information about customers, the newest products, and information about Prysmian’s plans to expand its manufacturing plants.
Much of the information was found in the possession of not just Szymanski and Sterlite, but also in the possession of executives at Sterlite’s global headquarters in India.
“It was clear that we had a solid case, and the jury decision [demonstrates that] we will not stand still when it comes to defending our confidential information and trade secrets, competing fairly in the marketplace, and doing right by our customers,” said Andrea Pirondini, Prysmian North America CEO. |
