The ongoing legal battles of Bumble and Match continue today. According to a statement issued by Match Group this morning, Bumble is withdrawing its $ 400 million lawsuit against Match, which had claimed that Match had fraudulently obtained trade secrets during the acquisition talks. However, Bumble is preparing to re-submit his claim at the state level, we are listening.
If you have not been following, the two companies have been fighting in the judicial system for some time after Match Group did not acquire Bumble twice: once in an agreement that would have valued it in more than one billion dollars.
Bumble claimed that Match later filed a lawsuit against him to make Bumble appear less attractive to other potential buyers. Match's lawsuit says that Bumble violated patents on things like the use of a stack of profile cards, the mutual acceptance option and his erasure-based gestures: things that Tinder had popularized in dating applications.
Bumble subsequently filed his own lawsuit in March 2018, claiming that Match used acquisition conversations to fraudulently obtain trade secrets. He says that this is not a counterclaim, but his own demand. (This is the one companies are discussing today).
Match says the papers were not delivered for Bumble's lawsuit. But Bumble's CEO, Whitney Wolfe, had said they delayed the service of the papers to give Match the opportunity to reach an agreement.
After a failure in the liquidation, Bumble announced on September 24, 2018 that he would serve Match and shared news about his OPI plans. The $ 400 million lawsuit claims that Match had requested "confidential and business secret information" to make a higher takeover bid for Bumble, but that there was no subsequent offer as a result.
Match says that Bumble asked the courts to withdraw their claim only a few weeks after this announcement, and believes that everything is just a public relations gimmick about Bumble's IPO.
Today's match says he does not object to the suspension of the lawsuit. But now he is seeking declaratory trials that will force these matters to be litigated in the appropriate forums, he says.
Notes that Bumble had filed his state petition in Dallas County, instead of responding with a counterclaim to Match's suit in the Western District of Texas: "within 160 kilometers of Bumble's headquarters in Austin. "
He requested that the case be transferred to the federal courts in the Western District, where his IP case is pending.
Now, Match says that Bumble is asking the courts to withdraw their claims against Tinder's parent company.
"We are not opposed to your request to dismiss your own claims, but we are seeking declaratory judgments that will force these issues to be litigated in the appropriate forums." Says a party spokesperson. "As we said in section 132 of the Amended counterclaim: "Match will not simply wait until Bumble decides whether or not to continue with these claims, probably in connection with Bumble's next media campaign. Match intends to litigate these baseless allegations now, and Match intends to conclusively rebut them. "
Bumble responded this morning by saying he plans to continue defending his business against Match.
" The Last Match Litigation They are part of their ongoing campaign to curb Bumble's momentum in the market. "Having tried and failed to acquire Bumble, Match now seems intent on trying to hurt the business he was so desperate to buy," says a spokesman for Bumble. "Bumble is not intimidated and will continue to defend his businesses and users against Match's erroneous claims."
Refused to comment on how, but we understand that the change from a system of state courts to federal courts is at stake here. Bumble wanted to litigate statewide, which means he has to dismiss his claims in federal courts. Match could then say precisely that Bumble's lawsuit is being dropped, but that does not necessarily mean that Bumble's plans have changed.
We understand that Bumble is now preparing to resubmit his case in the state's judicial system, but he has not. still.