A small company called Events Media Network Inc., which continually updates a massive database of public events, has cleared an early hurdle in a trade secrets fight it picked with The Weather Channel Interactive Inc.
In an eight-page ruling issued on Friday, U.S. district judge Robert Kugler in Camden, New Jersey refused to dismiss claims that The Weather Channel improperly used EMNI's databases after a contract between the two companies expired, thereby misappropriating EMNI's proprietary trade secrets. Kugler rejected arguments by The Weather Channel's lawyers at Duane Morris that EMNI failed to safeguard the databases, and that the event listings can't constitute trade secrets because of their public nature. The ruling is win for EMNI's lawyers at Eckert Seamans Cherin & Mellott.
