NEW YORK, Jan 25 (Reuters Legal) - China's Huawei Technologies Co Ltd won a temporary restraining order barring Motorola from disclosing any confidential Huawei information to rival Nokia Siemens Networks.
Huawei filed suit in Illinois federal court on Monday to block a proposed Motorola business unit sale to Nokia Siemens Networks, demanding that the $1.2 billion transaction be altered to avoid the transfer of trade secrets or the infringement of intellectual property rights. Huawei wants the deal to exclude any equipment based on widely used GSM and UMTS technology standards.
The defendants include Motorola Solutions Inc, which holds the network equipment unit being sold; and Motorola Mobility, which makes phones and set-top boxes, and holds Huawei intellectual property related to network technology. Motorola Mobility was split from the rest of Motorola on Jan. 4.
Motorola declined comment and a Huawei spokesman was not immediately available for comment.
In her order dated Monday, U.S. District Judge Sharon Johnson Coleman in Chicago told the defendants to give the court and Huawei immediate written notice of any actions being taken by China's antitrust regulator, which is currently reviewing Nokia Siemens' proposed purchase of the Motorola assets.
Nokia Siemens has said that the China review had delayed the closing of the deal, which is expected this quarter.
The judge also ordered Huawei and the Motorola defendants to propose a protective order within 24 hours.
Nokia Siemens is a venture of Finland's Nokia Oyj and Germany's Siemens AG.
Motorola itself filed suit against Huawei in July, alleging theft of trade secrets via former Motorola employees who gave information to Huawei's founder.
The latest case is Huawei Technologies Co v. Motorola Inc et al, U.S. District Court, Northern District of Illinois, No. 11-00497.
For Huawei: Robert Haslam, Stanley Young, Chris Martiniak, Dale Rice, Samuel Ernst, Nathan Shafroth and Robert Williams of Covington & Burling; H. Michael Hartmann and David Airan of Leydig, Voit & Mayer Ltd.
For Motorola: Thomas Frederick and Maureen Rurka of Winston & Strawn.
Motorola's suit against Huawei over alleged trade secret theft in the same court is Motorola Inc v. Lemko Corp et al, No. 08-05427.
For Motorola: Dan Webb, James McComb, Lawrence Desideri and Maureen Rurka of Winston & Strawn; Robert Halligan, Deanna Swits, Jason Kunze, Jodi Wine, John Chatowski, Michael Hallerud and Robert Weikert of Nixon Peabody.
For Huawei: Robert Haslam, Ashley Miller, Deanna Kwong, Feng Ma, Matthew Hawkinson, Michael Wickey, Nitin Subhedar and Stanley Young of Covington & Burling; David Airan and H. Michael Hartmann of Leydig, Voit & Mayer.
(Reporting by Jonathan Stempel of Reuters; Additional reporting by Terry Baynes of Reuters Legal)