In the lawsuit-plagued world of reporting and analytics software, the Circuit Court for Fairfax County, Va., ruled on Monday that MicroStrategy Inc.s trade secrets lawsuit against Actuate Corp. could proceed.
MicroStrategy had filed the suit last June, alleging that Actuate and two of its senior software engineers engaged in a conspiracy to misappropriate trade secrets belonging to MicroStrategy and then used those trade secrets in the design and development of Actuates Actuate 6 product.
The suit seeks an injunction blocking the further marketing and sale of Actuate 6; a constructive trust in favor of MicroStrategy on all of Actuates profits generated from the sale of Actuate 6, and treble damages.
Actuate had filed for a summary judgment to have the case thrown out on the grounds that the charges werent specific enough. But the court ruled that MicroStrategy had made its case specifically enough for the trial to proceed. The trial is scheduled to begin Nov. 4.
Last month Actuate reached an out-of-court settlement with Crystal Decisions after the latter had accused it of making false and misleading advertising and marketing claims.
MicroStrategy itself is dealing with a patent infringement claim from Business Objects SA, which has reached settlements on similar claims with Brio Software Inc. and Cognos Inc.