Suite, Currenex reach agreement to settle copyright infringement case
The parties expect to have a settlement agreement finalized in the next 45 days.
A copyright infringement lawsuit targeting Currenex, Inc., State Street Corporation and its wholly-owned subsidiary State Street Global Markets LLC, appears to be close to an end, as the parties in the case have informed the Honorable Paul A Engelmayer of the New York Southern District Court that they have reached a settlement in principle.
In a Letter to the Court, dated May 2, 2018, the plaintiff – Suite LLC, writing on behalf of all parties in the case, said the settlement would fully resolve the action. The parties expect to have a settlement agreement finalized in the next 45 days.
The case was launched by Suite LLC, a vendor of quantitative financial analytic software, in September 2017. The defendants were alleged to have infringed upon and misappropriated Suite’s intellectual property, including its source-code.
The action is based on events dating back to September 2011, when Suite signed an agreement with State Street and Currenex providing the latter with a perpetual license of Suite’s ALib Analytic Library (ALib), analytical software. The license was limited to State Street’s and Currenex’s use and precluded resale or sharing with third parties.
Currenex and State Street allegedly distributed Suite’s copyrighted, confidential software and source-code to third parties (including an existing customer of Suite, “TradingScreen,” and a competitor of Suite, Frost) without the consent or authorization of Suite, thus breaching the confidentiality provision and the restrictions stipulated in the contract. Specifically, Frost distributed Suite’s copyrighted source-code and software (that was licensed to State Street) directly to TradingScreen.
Suite has sought to permanently enjoin the defendants’ copyright infringement and misappropriation of Suite’s trade secrets; and to recover its damages arising from Defendants’ acts as well as punitive damages.
The defendants have replied that Suite is simply “unhappy with the deal it negotiated”, and that it is ignoring express contract terms.
The defendants argued that Suite’s claims against State Street premised on copyright law—direct, contributory, and vicarious copyright infringement—should be dismissed in their entirety for failure to state a claim upon which relief can be granted pursuant to Rule 12(b)(6) because the Supreme Court and the Second Circuit apply a three-year look-back period for copyright damages. In Suite’s Complaint, according to the defendants, all of the actions that Suite alleges State Street allegedly undertook occurred more than three years before Suite’s Complaint.
In addition, the defendants emphasized that Suite did not obtain a copyright registration for the ALib software until October 3, 2014, after the alleged occurrence of all accused activity by State Street, barring Suite from claiming statutory damages or attorneys’ fees.
The case is captioned SUITE, LLC v. CURRENEX, INC. et al (1:17-cv-06920).
