Sagent Pharmaceuticals v. Farco USA, LLC, et al., No. 25 C 14080, (N.D. Ill. May 5, 2026) (Kocoras, J.).
Judge Kocoras granted in part and denied in part defendants’ partial Fed. R. Civ. P. 12(b)(6) motion to dismiss in this Defend Trade Secrets Act, Illinois trade secret, and breach of contract action. Sagent alleged that three former employees conspired with German pharmaceutical manufacturer FARCO-PHARMA to replace Sagent as the exclusive U.S. distributor for GLYDO, a lidocaine jelly product, by forming defendant Farco USA.
The Court held that direct evidence of trade secret misappropriation is rare, and that Sagent’s allegations plausibly pled misappropriation as to Szurgot and Blasik, including:
- that Szurgot surreptitiously renamed confidential term sheet documents and sent them to his personal email;
- that Blasik emailed over 1,500 hospital division contacts to his personal email and downloaded confidential files to a personal USB drive;
- that both lied to Sagent investigators; and
- that Szurgot disclosed Sagent’s privileged negotiation strategy to FARCO-PHARMA.
The Court held that these allegations were not sufficient to state a direct misappropriation claim against Jensen, who served as Vice President of Finance and did not personally take or forward documents. However, the Court found that Sagent plausibly pled inevitable disclosure as to all three individual defendants. The Court noted that Farco USA was created to compete in the same national market Defendants oversaw at Sagent, that Defendants are poised to hold similar positions there, that none had experience in urology products before joining Sagent, and that Defendants had taken no steps to prevent use of Sagent’s trade secrets.
The Court also held that defendants’ request to strike injunctive relief was premature.
The tortious interference with contract and tortious interference with prospective economic advantage claims were dismissed without prejudice because Sagent failed to allege an actual breach of contract or adequately allege damages. Claims against Jensen for breach of fiduciary duty, unfair competition, civil conspiracy, breach of contract, and unjust enrichment survived.