Finally - a Sinovel Trial

Getting a case to trial is usually good news for one or the other companies that have been waiting a long time to get justice, but they may be just hoping for vindication and never get much satisfaction out of it.  This is, of course, Sinovel, the Chinese conglomerate which I wrote about in my first book, The Chinese Information War.  That was seven years ago, so American Superconductor has been waiting to get into court for a long time, but goes to trail in Wisconsin.  While they were waiting, they tried going through courts in China, and got nothing but a runaround where every court along the path up to the highest said “not enough evidence”.  This reminds me of several cases I was involved with, over the years, where a U.S. Attorney said the same thing.  They apparently needed a drug dealer caught with the stuff in his car or van, smoking a little, and having the exchange of money on camera.  Anything else was not enough.   American Superconductor knows who stole their software, where it was when it was stolen, and how much was paid for it.  Sinovel wanted to avoid that coming to court, but did nothing about a settlement that would have done that.  We are going to see a major case of Chinese theft of U.S. technology come to open trial, and that story will sound like a novel.  International intrigue, theft, and government spies everywhere.