Revcor, Inc. v. Fame, Inc.
| Decision Date | 17 July 1967 |
| Docket Number | Gen. No. 67--4 |
| Citation | 228 N.E.2d 742,85 Ill.App.2d 350 |
| Parties | REVCOR, INC., a Corporation, Appellant, v. FAME, INC., a Corporation, Rene Marchal William Fulton and Charles O. Wilson, Appellees. |
| Court | United States Appellate Court of Illinois |
Canfield, Canfield & Franks, Rockford, for appellant.
Miller, Thomas, Hickey & Collins, Williams, McCarthy, Kinley & Rudy, Rockford, for appellees.
Revcor, Inc., (herein called Revcor), plaintiff-appellant, brought this suit to enjoin the defendants, Fame, Inc., (herein called Fame), Rene Marchal, William Fulton and Charles Wilson from manufacturing and selling strip-type blower wheels. The trial court enjoined Fame, Marchal and Fulton from producing these wheels for a period of three months, but refused to issue an injunction prohibiting Wilson from selling such wheels. Revcor appealed and here contends that the injunction should have been granted for a longer period of time, and that the trial court also should have enjoined Wilson from selling the blower wheels.
Revcor was in the business of manfacturing air moving components. Marchal and Fulton were the incorporators and owners of United Tool and Engineering Company. They were tool and die makers who were hired by Revcor to produce certain tools and dies to enable Revcor to manufacture strip blower wheels. Fame was a corporation which was formed by Marchal and Fulton to manufacture and sell strip blower wheels in competition with Revcor. Wilson, who had been the sales manager for Revcor, left its employment and established his own business as a manufacturer's representative. Shortly thereafter, he became a representative of Fame, and sold strip blower wheels which it manufactured.
Revcor first started manufacturing blower wheels in 1953, but did not commence investigating strip-type blower wheels until sometime in 1957, and did not start producing this type of blower wheel until 1960. The strip-type blower wheel involved an entirely different manufacturing process than that utilized by Revcor in the manufacture of its other blower wheels. Initially, Revcor obtained the tools for the manufacture of the stip wheels from a Detroit Michigan company, but these did not perform form satisfactorily.
Sometime in 1961, Revcor contacted Marchal and Fulton regarding the tools needed for the manufacture of the strip wheels. Revcor had spent considerable time in making the drawings and designs it needed for this product. It gave its complete drawings to Marchal and Fulton, owners of United Tool and Engineering Company, so that they could construct the tools needed for the manufacture of the strip wheels. These drawings, not available to others, showed the complete details of the strip wheel--including angles, tolerances, dimensions, etc. In addition to the drawings turned over to them, Marchal and Fulton had complete access to the Revcor plant from 1961 to 1964. With this information, Marchal and Fulton manufactured the tools and dies used by Revcor in the production of the stip blower wheels.
In August of 1964, Revcor discovered that Marchal and Fulton, under the corporate name of Fame, were manufacturing strip blower wheels in competition with it. Certain testimony indicated that Fame's wheels more closely conformed to the Revcor drawings than did the Revcor wheels.
After discovering that Fame had entered into competition with Revcor, the president of Revcor went to the office of Fame and picked up a large number of drawings which belonged to Revcor and related to the strip wheel. The evidence was conflicting as to whether Marchal and Fulton could have duplicated the Revcor wheel from the wheel itself, or whether the use of the drawings and prints were necessary in order for Fame to reproduce the wheel in the period of time within which it started such production.
As to the defendant, Wilson: After leaving Revcor in December of 1964 to become a manufacturer's representative, he wrote and otherwise contacted a number of companies, including his former employer, Revcor, seeking to represent them. He had access to all information regarding plaintiff's customers while he was its sales manager, yet there was no evidence that he took any lists with him. Wilson testified that there are published lists of customers for blower products and that there is a directory of heating, air-conditioning and refrigeration industries--one of the major purchasers of blower wheels.
The strip blower wheel was not patented. A number of different companies manufactured such a wheel. It also seems apparent from the testimony of several of defendants' witnesses that the strip wheel could be copied--perhaps with some difficulty--from the wheel itself.
Revcor contends that its manufacturing plans and processes perfected over an extended period of investigation and development, are trade secrets; and that the defendants, Marchal and Fulton, appropriated these plans and processes unlawfully, by use of the specific and confidential information, the drawings and the designs given them by Revcor for the manufacture of its tools and dies.
The recent case of Schulenburg v. Signatrol, Inc., 33 Ill.2d 379, 212 N.E.2d 865 (1965) controls our determination in this case. In Schulenburg, the plaintiffs were engaged in the business of assembling light flashers, and the defendants--prior employees--set up a competing business. It was conceded that the flasher was not patented and that the method of assembly was not a trade secret. It was contended, however, that the manufacturing 'know-how' of plaintiffs was a trade secret. There, as in this case, it appeared that the defendants had utilized plaintiffs' blueprints and drawings used in the manufacturing process.
The court characterized the question before it as,
A trade secret is defined as 'a secret plan or process, tool, mechanism or compound known only to its owner and those of his employees to whom it is necessary to confide it.' Schulenburg v. Signatrol, Inc., supra, p. 385, 212 N.E.2d 868; Victor Chemical Works v. Iliff, 299 Ill. 532, 545, 546, 132 N.E. 806 (1921). A trade secret is something which must be held in secret or confidence by the one who possesses it, and it must relate to the trade or business. Unquestionably, the prints and drawings of Revcor were such a trade secret. They were not something held out for public domain but were treated, rather, as...
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