On April 30, 2020, a judge in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit affirmed a ruling in the matter of Advanced Fluid Systems., Inc. v. Huber et al, in which the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Pennsylvania ruled that the defendants misappropriated trade secrets related to a hydraulic fluid system rocket project.
The Third Circuit rejected the defendant’s argument that licensees do not have justification to protect trade secrets and “be compensated for their unlawful use and disclosure” because the Pennsylvania Uniform Trade Secrets Act (PUTSA) only requires the plaintiff to “lawfully possess the trade secrets it wishes to vindicate.” The trade secret misappropriation dispute began in December 2013, when Advanced Fluid Systems alleged that former sales engineer Kevin Huber divulged his employer’s trade secrets to a competitor before creating his own company related to hydraulic systems.
