A court has rejected the appeal of a former employee who is suing Apple over the disclosure of company technology

Last year, we informed you about the lawsuit that Apple decided to file against one of its former employees. Gerard Williams III worked at Apple for ten years until last March, and was involved in the development of the A-series processors, for example. After his departure, he founded his own company called Nuvia, which develops processors for data centers. Williams also lured one of his colleagues from Apple to work for Nuvia.

Apple accused Williams of breaching his employment contract and disclosing the company's technology. According to Apple, Williams intentionally kept his plans to leave the company a secret, profited from iPhone processor designs in his business, and allegedly started his own company in hopes that Apple would buy him out and use him to build future systems for its data centers. Williams in turn accused Apple of illegally monitoring his text messages.

In court today, however, Williams lost ground and asked Judge Mark Pierce to drop the suit, arguing that California law allows people to plan new businesses while they are employed elsewhere. But the judge denied Williams' request, saying that the law does not allow people in the course of their employment with one company to plan to start a competing business "on their working hours and with their employer's resources." The court also rejected Williams' claim that Apple executives illegally monitored his text messages.

Bloomberg reports that another standoff is planned for San Jose this week. According to Williams' lawyer Claude Stern, Apple should not be entitled to sue Williams because of the business plan. Stern says in his defense that his client has not taken any of Apple's intellectual property.

Source: Cult of Mac