The lawsuit against Nvidia claims that Mohammad Moniruzzaman, a senior staff member, inadvertently revealed stolen tech secrets from his former employer, Valeo, during an online presentation.

Valeo alleges that Moniruzzaman, who worked for its German arm, took gigabytes of data, including the source code for parking and driving assistance software, when he left to join Nvidia.

The lawsuit accuses Moniruzzaman of stealing Valeo’s proprietary software, and it suggests that Nvidia benefited financially from these stolen trade secrets.

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According to Valeo, Moniruzzaman’s brazen act of theft became apparent during a Microsoft Teams meeting in March 2022 when he accidentally displayed a file containing Valeo’s source code.

The file path reportedly still read “ValeoDocs,” indicating that it was a folder specifically containing documents taken from Valeo.

Valeo participants recognized the source code, captured screenshots, and reported the incident.

German authorities convicted Moniruzzaman in September 2023 for unlawfully holding Valeo’s data.

During the investigation, he admitted to stealing Valeo’s software and using it while employed at Nvidia.

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Valeo’s lawsuit against Nvidia alleges that the tech giant profited from these stolen trade secrets, saving millions of dollars in development costs and generating profits it did not rightfully earn.

The lawsuit, filed by Valeo Schalter und Sensoren GmbH, the German arm of the French firm, seeks substantial damages and requests the court to issue an injunction preventing Nvidia and its affiliates from using Valeo’s code.

The legal action has been initiated in a California court, where Nvidia is headquartered.

As part of the complaint, Valeo submitted a letter from Nvidia’s lawyers, stating that the tech giant was unaware of Moniruzzaman’s actions until May 2022.

According to the letter, Moniruzzaman claimed the code was stored only locally on his laptop, inaccessible to others at Nvidia.

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Nvidia asserts that it has no interest in Valeo’s code or alleged trade secrets and has cooperated fully in response to the situation.