Cisco furthered its intellectual-property theft lawsuit against Chinese rival Huawei Technologies this week by filing with the court several declarations supporting its claims, including one from a former Huawei subsidiary employee who said the company tried several times to hire away Cisco employees to duplicate their Cisco projects.

Former human resources manager Chad Reynolds, laid off from Huawei subsidiary FutureWei Technologies in December, said in a court document that he was asked at least twice to locate and hire Cisco employees who had worked on projects FutureWei hoped to mimic. In one instance, Reynolds said, his overtures led to talks between FutureWei and a Cisco engineer who initially showed interest in the proffered job but withdrew from negotiations after becoming uncomfortable with what he perceived as a request for confidential information.

That engineer, current Cisco employee Jack Flinsbaugh, also filed a declaration supporting Cisco's complaint, detailing his contact with FutureWei.

After initial discussions with FutureWei officials about a position at the firm, FutureWei asked him to travel to China to present a report answering a variety of questions about a project nearly identical to one he had just completed at Cisco, Flinsbaugh said in his testimony.

The IDG News Service is a Network World affiliate.