Aristocrat settles amicably with ex-developer named in L&W case

Aristocrat Leisure has settled with Dinh Toan Tran, a former employee who is alleged to have downloaded, without permission, more than 6,800 sensitive company files, and supposedly used them in helping his new employer, Light & Wonder, create a copy of the popular Dragon Link game by Aristocrat. The case was fought in Australia.

Tran admits to downloading a "substantial amount" of files

The resulting product, Dragon Train, has been hotly disputed by Aristocrat as an infringement on the company’s intellectual property.

The company secured an injunction against Light & Wonder in September, blocking its competitor from profiting from the game in the United States, and arguing that by copying Dragon Link, Light & Wonder had saved itself a substantial amount of money that would have otherwise gone in testing designs and concepts.

However, the lawsuit also involves Tran, with whom the company has now reached a settlement.

Aristocrat said that Tran had acknowledged that he had downloaded what was described as a "substantial volume" of files that were used to develop the Dragon Train game for Light & Wonder. Tran further acknowledged that his actions had indeed could be construed as a risk to Aristocrat Gaming’s operations.

Aristocrat happy with the outcome of the proceedings

For his part, Tran also noted that once he learned he would be moving jobs to Light & Wonder, he made sure to start deleting the files that he had previously downloaded.

Aristocrat CEO and Managing Director Trevor Croker has welcomed this development and the positive outcome of the discussions to settle the matter. Croker emphasized that Aristocrat’s IP assets were crucial for the company, as the company itself is an "ideas and innovation company at heart."

"Our intellectual property is therefore vital to our ongoing success, and we are committed to protecting the great work of our dedicated creative and technical teams," he stated firmly.

As we understand, Tran has also agreed to pay financial compensation to Aristocrat in order to settle the case, other than acknowledging his actions.

Aristocrat has accused Light & Wonder of both using its proprietary math that goes into the creation of its games as well as seeking to secure employees from its ranks to give itself an upper hand.

Image credit: Unsplash.com