Synectic Software Solutions, Inc., maker of VendSys Vending Management System, reports that it is very pleased with the Massachusetts federal court’s favorable ruling in a recent lawsuit brought by Gimme Vending, LLC, says VendSys President John Davies. The court rejected Gimme’s copyright infringement, misappropriation of trade secrets, unfair competition and breach of contract claims, and found that Gimme was not entitled to any monetary damages. The case related to a failed business relationship concerning the attempted integration of the Gimme’s Bluetooth Low Energy DEX reader, the Gimme Key, with VendSys’ handheld software. Gimme filed a seven-count complaint soon after VendSys advertised that it integrated with a competing Bluetooth device, wrongly alleging that VendSys copied Gimme’s technology in order to integrate with that competing device.
“It is very pleasing,” says Davies, that the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts ruled that VendSys did not infringe on any copyrighted material of Gimme, that VendSys did not misappropriate any of Gimme’s trade secrets, that VendSys did not engage in any unfair competition, and that VendSys did not breach its license agreement with Gimme. While the court found that VendSys should have returned Gimme’s SDK and deleted certain interface software placed in the VendSys app for purposes of integrating with the Gimme Key, the court also acknowledged that those materials lacked any use or commercial value in the VendSys app.
Indeed, the federal court found that the Gimme software fragments placed in the VendSys app for the failed Gimme integration “are not usable” and that they “have no commercial value.” Accordingly, the court rejected six of the seven claims alleged in Gimme’s complaint, finding that “there was no misappropriation of trade secrets here” and that Gimme was not entitled to any monetary damages.
“The fact that the court required us to remove the SDK defined interface from our software is in no way harmful to our own developments,” says Davies, “particularly when the software and SDK supplied from Gimme never worked as we intended.”
Further, “the stipulated injunction requiring us to delete the Gimme SDK and software fragmentsis moot,” says Davies, because Gimme interface had no function in VendSys Mobile-X, and because VendSys had already deleted the non-usable Gimme fragments from its app before the court order. “It makes no sense to try and use software that never worked with our app, and so we have no problem with the injunction. It is unfortunate that Gimme not only resorted to legal action but also made several claims that were untrue. We feel vindicated by the court’s ruling.”
“All in all, we are happy to move on and continue our own fully integrated systems using the VendSys Mobile-X tablet software,” says Davies. “There are at least two competing Bluetooth DEX reading devices that work with VendSys tablet software and so for us it is just business as usual.”
Synectic Software Solutions, Inc is the developer of VendSys. VendSys is a fully featured Vending Management System for full line vending operators, and includes highly functional Vending Route Management, OCS, Food Service, Kiosk integration and Maintenance Service modules. Email: [email protected]
