IBM has sued British outfit Micro Focus, claiming it illegally copied and reverse-engineered its software.
The copyright complaints in the US District Court in the Southern District of New York allege that Micro Focus stole IBM’s mainframe systems technology.
It said that Micro Focus created software called Micro Focus Enterprise Server and Micro Focus Enterprise Developer (collectively, Micro Focus Enterprise Suite) by using its developer access to copy IBM’s CICS Transaction Server for z/OS software.
The Newbury firm published, distributed, and promoted the Micro Focus Enterprise Suite Micro Focus and entered into contracts to benefit from IBM’s developer programmes and gain access to its technology.
IBM asserted that these actions constitute “illegal opportunism, wilful infringement, and blatant breach of Micro Focus’s contractual obligation” and undermine IBM’s significant investments in software innovation.
“Micro Focus has brazenly stolen IBM software and we are going to protect IBM’s product development investment from Micro Focus’ illegal tactics”, IBM said in a statement.
IBM’s complaint seeks monetary relief as well as an injunction against Micro Focus that would prohibit the company from continuing to harm IBM by illegally copying and distributing its software.
