CA Sues Rocket Software For $200 Million

Systems management software company CA, no stranger to legal troubles of its own over the last few years, came out swinging on the other end Thursday, accusing Rocket Software of stealing source code and the development environment for CA's database management products.

In a lawsuit filed with the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York, CA says Rocket developers formerly employed by CA or an acquired subsidiary "knowingly and intentionally stole from CA" to develop many of Rocket's products. The suit asks for $200 million in damages.

"The facts here demonstrate blatant misappropriation by Rocket of CA's intellectual property," Gary Brown, CA's director of litigation, said in a statement. "We believe that Rocket's management not only condoned the conduct of its employees, but also made false and misleading statements to cover up this conduct."

CA says Rocket has used CA intellectual property in software to manage IBM DB2 relational databases. CA also claims that, despite complaining to Rocket, the company continues to ship tools that include CA intellectual property, and CA is seeking an injunction to prevent Rocket from doing so. When contacted, Rocket Software refused comment.

The CA lawsuit comes on the heels of solid news for Wall Street in quarterly earnings filed Wednesday. The company, which had been struggling to regain its footing after weathering a $2.2 billion accounting scandal, more than tripled its profit to $129 million on revenue of $1.03 billion. New orders were up an impressive 48% over last year.