The court seized 140 million rubles from a group of companies due to a dispute with Uraltechnostroy Corporation

The dispute between Uraltechnostroy and its former employees began over the development of the Ural-MR multiphase flow meter (MFM). A flow meter is a device that allows separate measurement of the volume of oil, water and gas in a multiphase flow without prior separation.

In the course of work on innovative equipment from 2017 to 2022, 5 patents were registered. In May 2022, Uraltechnostroy sold the first prototype. At about the same time, the Kazan branch of the All—Russian Research Institute of Metrology received a multiphase flow meter "Measuring mobile installation - VARG-M" on the chassis of a KamAZ car for testing. Uraltechnostroy reported that "after the dismissal of employees of the Moscow office, the corporation conducted an audit and revealed the facts of theft of material assets (including detectors for MFM) and intellectual property of the corporation on physical media, the deterioration of documentation on the server, which caused significant economic damage, copyright, inventive, patent the rights of the corporation."

The Ufa District Court took interim measures in the claim of Uraltechnostroy Corporation against a group of companies — NPC Laplace, NTC Laplace, Neftemash Engineering, ATD Group and entrepreneurs Stepan Polikhov, Taras Bondarenko, Marat Akhlyamov. The corporation demands to recover 140 million rubles of losses. The court seized the property and accounts of the companies for this sum, and also forbade the defendants to produce and sell a Varg multiphase flow meter.

At the same time, Stepan Polikhov believes that he is the author "who was robbed of the exclusive rights" to the development. According to Polikhov, the Ufa District Court banned Uraltechnostroy from producing and selling the Ural-MR MFR until an agreement was concluded with Polikhov on the joint use of development rights.

Thus, both sides accuse each other of not complying with the court order. The corporation says that Polikhov sold four controversial installations in two years, without having patent rights at that time and without coordinating the sale with the corporation.

"If the Intellectual Property Rights Court recognizes Polikhov as a co-author of the invention during a new review of the case, then he and the company will jointly own the patent," said Sergey Zuykov, patent attorney and managing partner of Zuykov and Partners. "From the available materials, it is impossible to conclude exactly how the authors transferred the rights to the invention they created to the corporation. In the absence of written documents confirming the transfer of the invention from the author (or authors) to the corporation, it can be concluded that Polikhov will become a co—owner of the patent together with the corporation," says Zuykov.

Source: RBC