Nvidia denies Valeo’s code theft allegations

Nvidia has hit back at allegations that it had stolen business secrets from French automotive company Valeo, saying in a new court filing that it had cooperated with local authorities and found no trace of Valeo’s code in its internal systems.

In a lawsuit filed against Nvidia by Valeo in November, it was alleged that Mohammad Moniruzzaman, a former Valeo employee, inadvertently exposed stolen source code from Valeo during a videoconference call with both Nvidia and Valeo employees.

Valeo accused Nvidia of benefiting from the stolen code, which Moniruzzaman admitted to taking, as per the November filing. 

The November filing also said that Moniruzzaman admitted to German police that he stole Valeo’s software for use at Nvidia, and authorities found Valeo documentation and hardware pinned on the walls – a “constant reference tool for him while working at Nvidia.”

But Nvidia has entirely denied these allegations and has asked a court to dismiss the case with costs.

“Nvidia has never wanted or needed Valeo’s alleged trade secrets, but it has no practical use for them either,” it said in the filing, explaining that Valeo’s use of older, conventional technologies and task-specific components for different vehicle areas is entirely different from Nvidia’s end-to-end integrated approach.

Valeo employee acted on his own accord

Moniruzzaman provided affidavits stating that he never shared Valeo’s code or documents with other Nvidia employees, the court filing said, except for an accidental screen share during a call with Valeo that lasted less than five minutes.

“Affidavits Moniruzzaman submitted to the German court establish that [he] acted on his own, informed no one at Nvidia of his actions, and never shared Valeo’s alleged trade secrets with Nvidia,” the filing read. “The Nvidia employees who worked with Moniruzzaman similarly declared that they never knew of, much less used, any of Valeo’s alleged trade secrets.”

Nvidia accused Valeo of pressing unfounded and false accusations in Germany that Nvidia had actively sought Valeo code and used it to develop its products.

Valeo petitioned a German Court to appoint an independent expert to inspect Nvidia’s code base for any Valeo code, and after extensive investigations, the expert found no evidence of Valeo code in Nvidia’s code, the filing said.

The German court further awarded Nvidia costs. Nvidia also said it removed all code contributed by Moniruzzaman during his tenure.

Valeo had ineffective data protection mechanisms

Even though Nvidia denies that Valeo’s code had ever touched its systems, it did point out that the company’s efforts to protect its alleged trade secrets were “ineffective and unreasonable.”

“Valeo’s former employee was able to copy and download a significant amount of alleged Valeo trade secrets using rudimentary techniques,” the filing reads. “Despite the former employee allegedly downloading the information in April 2021, Valeo did not discover this activity until sometime after March 8, 2022.”

Nvidia also says that Valeo failed to mitigate any damages they might have hypothetically suffered, as they did not confirm the removal of their source code from the employee’s possession upon his departure, delayed taking legal action, and chose not to inform Nvidia immediately upon discovering the retained code.

A date for a jury trial has yet to be announced.