Mitsubishi Aircraft Corporation America asked a federal judge in Seattle Thursday to dismiss a lawsuit alleging it systematically stole proprietary information from regional-jet rival Bombardier of Canada.
The Bombardier suit, filed in October, alleged Mitsubishi recruited Bombardier employees who, before they left, illicitly emailed batches of its trade secrets to help get the Japanese planemaker's long-delayed Mitsubishi Regional Jet (MRJ) certified by U.S. regulators.
In a statement, Mitsubishi said it can "categorically deny Bombardier's claims," adding that the alleged stolen materials "would not be useful or applicable to our program, which relies on a unique certification process."
Development of the MRJ, which comes in 69-seat and 76-seat models, was running years late before Mitsubishi in 2014 announced its flight tests for certification would be conducted at Moses Lake, with a large complement of engineers based in Seattle to oversee the work. The program now employs some 600 people in Washington state, about half from Japan.
The lawsuit names as defendants not only Mitsubishi in Japan and its American subsidiary, but also AeroTEC, the Seattle-based engineering partner hired to help with U.S. certification, as well as 93 former Bombardier employees.
The Canadian jetmaker alleged that Mitsubishi deliberately poached its employees through job fairs near Bombardier headquarters in Montreal and in Wichita, Kan., where it conducts flight tests of its business jets.
And the lawsuit names five former Bombardier engineers accused of specific theft of proprietary trade secrets, citing sensitive technical documents related to airplane certification sent to their home email addresses in the days and weeks before they left Bombardier.
Bombardier said the impact of the alleged theft of propietary information is "evidenced by the fact that shortly after a critical mass of former Bombardier personnel began working" for Mitsubishi and AeroTEC, the Japanese planemaker "abandoned its design of certain MRJ systems and electrical configurations in favor of a new design that would be easier to certify."
Much of Mitsubishi's response is taken up with a technical legal argument that seeks to separate the responsibility of Mitsubishi Aircraft Corporation America from that of Mitsubishi Aircraft Corporation in Japan and that of AeroTEC.
The filing asserts that the key decision to redesign part of the airplane was not made by the America subsidiary "or even involved anyone in the United States." Thus, the plea essentially questions the jurisidiction of a court in Seattle to settle the dispute.
Jeff Dronen, director of strategic communications at Mitsubishi Aircraft Corp. America, dismissed the poaching allegation, saying in an interview that "experience and knowledge gained from working at a company is not (protected) intellectual property."
The filing for dismissal argues that Bombardier only sued after it failed to force Mitsubishi into an "illegal no-poaching agreement." And it offers the "entirely innocent alternative explanation" that "the general skills and experience of the entire MRJ team" advanced the project toward completion rather than the misappropriation of Bombardier secrets.
As for the alleged theft of documents, Dronen said "there's other reasons why people would send stuff to their home email addresses other than to acquire or misappropriate information."
"I email stuff to myself to work on at home," Dronen added. "It's easier."
Mitsubishi's filing for dismissal also argues that none of the allegedly stolen documents relate to the avionics bay or electrical wire routing issues, which were the focus of the 2017 MRJ redesign cited by Bombardier.
Dronen said that because the MRJ competes directly against Bombardier's CRJ regional jets, Mitsubishi sees the lawsuit "as an effort to stall our program by chilling the market or restricting the flow of people into our program."
The MRJ's planned entry into service is now 2020, seven years later than originally planned. Yet despite the huge extra development expenses, now well over $5 billion, Mitsubishi Heavy Industries (MHI), the parent company of Mitsubishi Arcraft Corp. (MAC), remains committed to funding the program.
Earlier this month, MHI forgave $445 million of debt owed to it by MAC.
