A company that provides devices, software and information technology (IT) services to schools has been granted a High Court injunction over alleged unlawful accessing of confidential data by former employees working for competitors.
Judge David Nolan said he was satisfied to grant the injunction to Upskill Online Ltd, trading as Olive Media, as he was satisfied there was a prima facie case of “commercial sabotage” in the manner in which the defendants had interacted with and taken clients away from Upskill.
Upskill, based in Beacon South Quarter, Sandyford, Dublin, is suing Ian Gaughran; Erik Jentetics; Fintan Costello; PNS Ltd, trading as PC Peripherals; Grafton Digital Ltd; and Eduvolve Ltd.
The judge made the orders following a one-side-only application from counsel Jarlath Ryan, with Arthur Cunningham, and returned the case to next Wednesday’s holiday sittings.
Upskill says Gaughran breached a March settlement agreement over an action brought over the alleged misappropriation and misuse of confidential information and assets of Upskill.
Gaughran was Upskill’s former head of formal education, on a salary of €120,000 plus benefits, and was part of the settlement agreement.
What size does your pension actually need to be for a comfortable retirement?
Jentetics is chief executive of Grafton Digital and a director of PNS. He was also a defendant in the previous case but no settlement agreement was entered into with him.
Upskill chief executive Brendan Kavanagh said in an affidavit seeking the injunction that PNS was in direct competition with his company and had made considerable efforts in recent months to acquire Upskill’s customers. PNS provides its competing service through Eduvolve.
The other defendant, Fintan Costello, resigned from Upskill last January and days before he did so sought to have the company’s Office 365 customer invoicing and support contract records exported and compiled for his own use, Kavanagh said.
Investigations revealed that Costello had unlawfully accessed Upskill’s confidential commercial information on eight separate occasions in March, April and May last.
Kavanagh said the previous settled proceedings revealed there was little doubt that Costello and Gaughran remained in close contact.
He said Gaughran has been actively assisting the business of PNS and in breach of the March settlement agreement. In recent times, Upskill licensing contracts with about 20 schools have been lost to competitors despite this industry being one of significant growth generally, he said.
The defendants had also misappropriated Upskill’s property and Gaughran was in ongoing breach of the settlement in relation to the return of certain property, he said.
Unless restrained by the court, Gaughran would continue to act in breach of his obligations not to compete with Upskill following termination of his employment, he said.
The business developed by the defendants, with the unlawful assistance of each of them and including unlawful accessing of confidential information and misappropriation of assets, was damaging Upskill’s legitimate commercial interests, he said.