Would you like to Steal our Idea? An interesting case study of patent infringement and NDA violation

 In 2003 I [Salman Khan] had an idea of creating a device which would enable people to control all their electronic devices by hands and fingers. I started researching if no such product exists and came to a conclusion that no such product exist and neither is any one working on such an idea . After Getting the NDA signed I shared my idea with a friend Fahad which was my team mate in another project we had been working on. We together started working on the idea and in 2005 we [Salman Khan, Fahad ajab khan] founded a company called LEAP Inc. We started making prototype and submitted an application to the US Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) to patent our product, in July, 2006 we made the first working prototype and in Dec, 2006 our product got patent on our name we got the patient no# PN-1330 and recognition of innovation as novel from the US Patent and Trademark Office.

                We presented our prototype in the 22^nd international technology fair held in Hong Kong(2007) where we got an award for the Innovative Product of the year and 50$ thousand . We started improving our product and haired some software engineers to help develop some application for our product. In June 2007 we got a mail from HP (Hewlett-Packard) that they are interested in working with us in the development of this new technology and they want to know more about out our product. We sent them a concept note and asked them to sign the NDA in order to discuss the technicality of the product. They called us to the Head Office of HP after HP signing the NDA and us disclosing the technicality of our product they agreed to invest in the development of our technology and we signed a memorandum of understanding to work as a Joint venture. The joint venture agreement we agreed upon was that we’ll develop the product and work for the advancement of the product and HP will help us in marketing and mass production of the product and both the parties will have 50% ownership of the product.

In Jan, 2008 we signet the final agreement with HP and got an investment of 5$ Million and we came up with the final product the LEAP MOTION DEVICE in Aug, 2008. And we started its mass production and made it available to the researchers and developers in Sept, 2008 and for the general public in Jan, 2009.

The computer industry became our major consumer and we made a compact version for the HP-Laptops. The business of HP boasted and they experienced a 53% growth in their revenue, we signed a project with NASA to provide then leap motion solutions and we joined hands with a computer scientist and inventor Doc. Zardari and started working on making our device ubiquitous, we came up with an idea to make our leap motion device wearable and we made our very first prototype in Fab, 2010.

In March 2010 when going through a tech magazine Doc Zardari found that one of the employee Yousaf raza gelani which had recently left the company was at the 25^th International Technology fair presenting a similar wearable device they had been working on and calling it p3c Armband. He came to me and we investigated the device and we found out that it was a copy of the prototype we just made with slight modifications.

We immediately filed a case against him calming that he has violated the NDA and production and selling of the device will be breaching out patent technology because he had signed a calibration agreement with Fujistsu Inc. and had plans of producing the device in large quantity.

In August, 2010 a ten day jury trial began, the firm they brought against us was the Bangali Baba Layers Firm. Who were very expert in patent and NDA infringement cases they brought important expertise in patent litigation. The jury found out that there were important points missing in the NDA which was signed among both the parties. After a 10 day trail the jury concluded that the device which Yousaf raza gelani had was not infringing our patent because the patent we had registered was a device with connects to another device and it was not wearable and no point about wearable devices had been mentioned. And allowed Yousaf Raza gelani to freely develop and distribute his product.

The case cost us around 14.8$ Million. In January 2011 we launched our device the Myo band which dominated the market the their shares went down after launching another version of your product in August 2011 the gaming industry became our major consumer and almost all the games now use our technology , In the end we won but from the case we got some good lessons.

And now all the leading companies use our technology, almost every new game coming over use our device. Every new Hp laptop uses a piece of hardware which is manufactured by Leap Inc.