Satyam loses appeal in Upaid case

Satyam loses appeal in Upaid case

Court of Appeal in London affirms a January High Court Judgment in Upaid’s favour against Satyam Computer Services

Wednesday, May 14, 2008

LONDON, ENGLAND: Online and mobile payments service leader Upaid Systems today said that the Court of Appeal in London affirmed a January High Court Judgment in Upaid’s favour against Satyam Computer Services, rejecting the Indian software leader’s effort to block Upaid’s fraud and forgery claims in a Texas court.

The decision confirms an earlier High Court judgment in favour of Upaid on all points. This ruling allows Upaid's lawsuit against Satyam alleging forgery, fraud, misrepresentation, and breach of contract, and what Satyam admits are “extremely large sums of money”, to proceed to a US trial by jury in a Texas federal court.

Upaid originally filed the Texas lawsuit in April 2007 following the revelation in Texas of forged documents previously provided by Satyam to Upaid.

Satyam had sought a High Court injunction in London in September 2007 to try to block the Texas case, arguing that a 2003 commercial agreement terminating the relationship between the two companies precluded all future claims against it for all past practices and that any residual claims against it had to be tried in London.

The High Court categorically refused Satyam's request in January 2008.

After hearing testimony from senior executives of both companies and legal experts in a four-day trial, the Court ruled that the Texas claims could proceed.

Satyam appealed this decision, and it was this appeal which was comprehensively dismissed last Friday by a Court of Appeal panel presided over by Lord Justice Waller, vice president of the Court of Appeal Civil Division. Costs were awarded against Satyam.

In their further plea to the Court of Appeal for leave to appeal to the House of Lords Satyam admitted that, “…the effect of the judgment is that collateral proceedings in Texas will proceed. These are likely to be highly detrimental to the Appellant and extremely large sums of money are at stake."

Leave to appeal to the House of Lords was denied by the Court of Appeal.

Upaid spokesperson Joanne Hunter said, "We think this case is of considerable importance. Satyam is one of India's largest and best-known providers of outsourced software services. As they themselves said last Friday, the Court of Appeal result is likely to be very detrimental to them and a lot is at stake."

"This is a very serious case of misconduct that involves fraud and forgery by one of India’s leading software companies. The damage done to Upaid has been made even worse by the time wasted in London while Satyam tried to avoid the consequences of their own actions, rather than doing all it could to help a former customer by addressing the substantive issues raised in Texas. But, with the London issues out of the way, we can now look forward to dealing with what really matters in Texas, where the forgeries first came to light,” Hunter added.

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