CesiumAstro alleges in a newly filed lawsuit {that a} former government disclosed commerce secrets and techniques and confidential details about delicate tech, buyers and clients to a competing startup.
Austin-based Cesium develops active-phased array and software-defined radio programs for spacecraft, missiles and drones. Whereas phased-array antenna programs have been used on satellites for many years, Cesium has significantly superior and productized the tech over its seven years in operation. The startup has landed greater than $100 million in enterprise and authorities funding, which it has used to develop a collection of merchandise for industrial and protection clients.
The expertise is area of interest: Solely a handful of corporations work on the reducing fringe of space-based radio expertise, and Cesium little doubt pays shut consideration to any new entrant on this discipline. AnySignal, a startup that got here out of stealth final October however was formally integrated in 2022, actually caught the corporate’s eye, not least as a result of it allegedly edged out Cesium in a gross sales bid to a significant buyer and by trying to solicit the curiosity of one in every of Cesium’s early buyers — each examples said within the lawsuit.
In response to the go well with, filed on March 25, these examples are immediately associated to former VP of Product Erik Luther’s misappropriation of commerce secrets and techniques and confidential data on buyers and clients, which Cesium alleges he subsequently disclosed to AnySignal. Notably, Luther didn’t depart Cesium to work for AnySignal, as an alternative taking a job as head of selling at an organization that operates in a unique sector fully. However the go well with says that Luther maintained “private connections” with AnySignal’s co-founders, having labored with AnySignal CEO John Malsbury beforehand at a unique firm.
This resulted in AnySignal “recruiting and inducing Luther … to improperly disclose” the confidential and commerce secret data, the go well with says. AnySignal’s CEO and CesiumAstro didn’t reply to TechCrunch’s request for remark; a lawyer representing Luther referred TechCrunch to the March 29 authorized filings cited beneath.
Cesium is evident on its place within the lawsuit: It doesn’t consider that AnySignal may have developed its complicated radio expertise on its timeline and with its current assets — “absent CesiumAstro’s technical diagrams and specs (to which Luther had entry).”
“With just a few workers and $5 million in investor funding, [AnySignal] wouldn’t even be in the identical orbit as CesiumAstro, which has spent tens of hundreds of thousands of {dollars} working with (now) 170 workers for seven years to develop its applied sciences,” the go well with says. “However with Luther’s assist, AnySignal has launched to immediately compete with CesiumAstro within the specialised area for software-defined radios.”
Luther strongly denied all of the allegations in two separate paperwork filed with the courtroom on March 29; concerning the declare that he labored in live performance with AnySignal, he says the allegation is “not solely false…however invented out of entire material.” (The response additionally denies Cesium’s declare that it’s an “business chief.”)
Cesium “doesn’t cite any info or proof in any way linking Luther and any of AnySignal’s enterprise efforts and the alleged proof that [Cesium] does cite don’t help [its] contentions,” Luther’s lawyer claims within the submitting. He goes on to say that Cesium takes a “Grand Canyon-sized leap from the paltry, simply explainable proof it cites to the outstanding allegation that Luther has been secretly aiding AnySignal and feeding them [Cesium’s] commerce secrets and techniques with out citing any proof in any way.”
El Segundo-based AnySignal was based in Could 2022 by Malsbury and COO Jeffrey Osborne, and emerged from stealth touting $5 million in seed funding final yr. The corporate is growing a software-defined radio platform; Cesium’s lawsuit names it as a “direct competitor.” In February, a month earlier than the go well with was filed, AnySignal introduced it had landed a partnership with personal area station developer Huge for a complicated communication system for Huge’s flagship station, Haven-1.
The go well with was filed in Western District of Texas underneath no. 1:24-cv-314.
