A New York judge has ordered ex-IBM executive Mark Papermaster to immediately cease working for Apple, based on IBM's lawsuit, which asserts that Mr. Papermaster violated a non-compete contract and his experience and knowledge may harm IBM’s market positions.

Lawyers for both sides had to submit papers by November 11, and the court will hear the case on November 18, reports ChannelWeb web-site. The ex-IBM employee joined the company as the vice president of devices hardware engineering. Mark Papermaster was to lead Apple’s iPod and iPhone hardware engineering teams.

IBM asserts that while working for the company, Mr. Papermaster gained information and experiences that would now work against IBM.

“In his capacity as a member of the [Integration & Values Team], Mr. Papermaster has gained access to confidential information concerning the company's strategic plans, marketing plans and long-term business opportunities, including the development of specific IBM products. We will vigorously pursue this case in court,” IBM said in a statement.

IBM is not a consumer-oriented company, as Mr. Papermaster said in papers for the court, but IBM believes otherwise and claims that it does compete against Apple in certain cases.

IBM said in its filing that it is a competitor against Apple “in the design, manufacture and sale of electronic devices, including servers, personal computers and microprocessors”. It is interesting to note that IBM does not sell or design or manufacture PCs, whereas Apple does not design microprocessors that could compete against IBM’s PowerPC aimed at high-performance computing solutions.

Tags: Apple, IBM, Papermaster