Do not mess with the master of paper, friends. He will file his way into court so quick even The Flash gets dizzy. Firing back at the suit launched by IBM that the former employee violated his contract when he went to Apple, the company’s new senior vice president of devices hardware engineering Mark Papermaster said that he believed he was in the clear.
IBM says that the executive’s contract contained a non-compete clause and that his acceptance of employment at Apple constituted competition. Papermaster maintains that Apple and IBM are not competitors, and that his knowledge of IBM trade secrets is irrelevant, since he will be working on the iPod and iPhone.
“To the best of my knowledge, IBM does not design, manufacture or market consumer electronic products,” said Mark Papermaster, in a court document filed Thursday. “Instead, IBM focuses on high-performance business systems such as information technology infrastructure, servers and information storage products, and operating systems software,” Papermaster noted.
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“I do not recall a single instance of Apple being described as a competitor of IBM during my entire tenure at IBM,” Papermaster stated.
Big Blue is asking the court to prevent Papermaster from working at Apple, so it’ll be up to a judge to decide whether the claim has merit. Now, we’re certainly not legal scholars here, but we’re pretty sure that Papermaster will come on top in the ensuing contest—unless, of course, IBM throws scissors.
