Trial Litigation firm Susman Godfrey won a legal battle for real estate analytics firm HouseCanary against Quicken Loans affiliate,Title Source. After seven weeks, the twelve person jury found unanimously in favor of HouseCanary, awarding the high tech company $706.2 million in counterclaims for Title Source’s misappropriation of trade secrets and breach of contract.
The case began when Title Source refused to pay HouseCanary for 18 months of work on software development, instead suing the company in a declaratory judgement to avoid contract fees. HouseCanary filed a countersuit, and discovered that Title Source misappropriated the company’s trade secrets, breaking previously signed agreements on non-disclosure and the use of HouseCanary information.
The Title Source family of companies, including Quicken Loans, wanted access to HouseCanary’s data and technologies on appraisal analytics and real estate valuation to develop competing software and analytics. For this, the jury awarded HouseCanary $235.4 million in damages for the misappropriation of trade secrets and fraud claims, then an additional $471.4 million in punitive damages.
Max Tribble, serving as lead counsel for HouseCanary, talked about the outcome of the lawsuit, saying that, “We are very pleased we could obtain this result for our client. Our firm’s experience in high-tech trade secret cases enabled us to secure this substantial win in a hard-fought trial.”
