March 31/00 / Reuters / By Rita Farrell
WILMINGTON, Del. - The DuPont Co. has, according to this story, taken aim
at rival Monsanto Co.'s shares of the U.S. cotton, soybean seed and
herbicide markets by filing two federal lawsuits, both alleging antitrust
violations and
one adding allegations of theft of trade secrets.
The story says that in the Delaware U.S. District Court, DuPont sought a
jury
trial on its antitrust claims and an award of unspecified triple damages. In
the soybean case, DuPont also asked that it be awarded all profits Monsanto
earned as a result of its alleged "misappropriation" of DuPont trade
secrets.
DuPont alleged that Monsanto induced a subsidiary to
provide it with DuPont's proprietary molecular breeding
technology used to grow a better variety of plants and get them
to market sooner.
The story adds that beginning in 1988, DuPont exchanged this genetic marker
technology with Michigan-based Asgrow Seed Co. LLC. The result
was a soybean seed resistant to DuPont's sulfonylurea class of
herbicides (SU). DuPont expected demand for its sulfonylurea
herbicides would increase as sales of sulfonylurea-tolerant
soybean seeds, or STS, increased.
Monsanto acquired Asgrow in 1997 and, according to court
papers, used DuPont's technology "to expedite and advance"
Monsanto's development of a competing product, Roundup Ready
soybeans which are resistant to Monsanto's Roundup, the world's
largest selling herbicide, the lawsuit says.
(posted without permission)
