Intel sued by Hadoop company Zettaset

By Juha Saarinen on Oct 15, 2013 6:35AM

Trade secret misappropriation alleged.

Intel has been sued by a former partner who alleges the chip giant misappropriated trade secrets around enterprise Hadoop management software.

Zettaset chief executive Jim Vogt said in a statement the two companies had been involved in a "deep business relationship" around the Orchestrator Hadoop management layer since 2012.

During that time, Vogt said, Intel had access to Zettaset product and technology, including proprietary and highly confidential information. The aim of the partnership was to form a commercial relationship with Intel, he said.

Intel released its own Hadoop management framework in February this year, which Vogt said is directly competitive with Zettaset's Orchestrator.

“We have made significant investments in developing our Orchestrator management platform,” said Vogt.

“We had no alternative but to take legal action to protect our intellectual property so we can continue to invest in our cutting edge technology and provide solutions that address the growing needs of the Big Data market,” Vogt said.

Zettaset did not say what remedies it is seeking from Intel.

Intel has not yet issued comment on the case which was filed in a US civil court last week and is expected to go into pre-trial stage in February next year.