The High Court has found that software developer Robert Harris breached his agreement with Visusoft Ltd by retaining a copy of the company's Datapos programme after his employment ended.
The dispute concerned software developed before, during and after Mr Harris's 15 months with Visusoft. He had previously developed a product known as Risc 5. From early 2005, he worked on adapting and developing that software into Visusoft's Datapos system.
After leaving Visusoft in March 2006, Mr Harris developed Risc 7 through ARH Software Solutions Ltd. Visusoft claimed that Risc 7 was effectively a copy of Datapos and relied on copyright as well as agreements governing software developed during Mr Harris's employment.
Mr Justice Roderick Murphy found there had been no transfer to Visusoft of Mr Harris's intellectual property in the earlier Risc 5 product. The company's rights therefore centred on the incremental development carried out for Datapos during his employment.
Expert evidence identified common files, code and structures between Datapos and Risc 7. One expert described very extensive similarities, while an expert for Mr Harris estimated shared code at about 8%. The court found that Mr Harris had retained and copied elements of work he carried out for Visusoft.
However, the judge was not satisfied that those elements constituted a substantial part of Risc 7. He found that the underlying structure of the later programme derived more from Risc than from Datapos, taking account of Risc 5's common ancestry and further development after Mr Harris left Visusoft.
A separate issue arose from Mr Harris's possession of Datapos itself. After his departure he had expressly confirmed that he no longer held copies of source code or components. Evidence later showed a complete copy of Datapos and source code on a server and other deleted Datapos material on development computers.
The court concluded that this breached the parties' May 2005 agreements and Mr Harris's undertaking on departure. The amount of damages arising from that contractual breach was left for a further hearing.