The company claims that Dr. Chen Shi has transferred Apple Watch technology to his new employer, China’s Guangdong Oppo Mobile Telecommunications.
According to claim, a former Apple Watch team member who worked as a sensor system architect, conspired to steal confidential information and pass it on to Oppo, Apple’s competitor in the wearable market. This happened a few weeks after Apple has filed a lawsuit against Mr. Di Liu, a former senior systems product development engineer on the Vision Pro team, accusing him of stealing secrets for Snap. Dr. Shi allegedly began secretly communicating with Oppo’s senior management while still working at Apple in April.
The defendant allegedly used meetings with the technical team to gather secrets of the Apple Watch and downloaded 63 confidential documents from the company’s secure server just days before he resigned on June 27. The stolen documents contained information about Apple chips, unreleased products and features, and technical details of ECG and PPG sensors. Apple also pointed to Dr. Jijin Zeng, Oppo’s vice president of healthcare, with whom Dr. Shi had been in contact. The company claims that Zeng replied “okay” and added an “OK” emoji to Shi’s next message:
“I plan to start work on June 30. This week I will inform my team of my resignation. Recently, I have also been reviewing various internal materials and holding many one-on-one meetings to gather as much information as possible — I will share it with you all later.”
After the data was stolen, Shi tried to cover his tracks, as evidenced by his searches for “how to wipe data from MacBook” and “can someone check if I opened a file on a shared drive?” He also deleted the folder with the stolen files from his work laptop after transferring it to an external USB drive. He then lied to his colleagues that he was traveling to China to take care of his elderly parents. In comparison, Dr. Liu, a former Vision Pro engineer, also told that he was supposedly leaving to focus on his family and health.
Apple claims to have uncovered the conspiracy by reviewing the file download logs and content of Dr. Shi’s work MacBooks and iPhones. Oppo has already officially responded to the lawsuit regarding espionage in favor of a Chinese company:
“We are aware of the recent lawsuit filed by Apple in California and have carefully reviewed the allegations in Apple’s complaint. We have not found any evidence to establish any connection between these allegations and the employee’s behavior during his or her employment with OPPO. OPPO respects the trade secrets of all companies, including Apple, and OPPO did not misappropriate Apple’s trade secrets. OPPO will actively cooperate with the legal process, and we are confident that a fair trial will bring out the facts.”
In the lawsuit, Apple seeks an injunction that would prevent Oppo and Shi from using its trade secrets. The plaintiff also seeks compensation for financial losses and punitive damages as punishment for the alleged theft. Apple is also demanding a jury trial.
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