Sarine Technologies Ltd, the Israeli-based, Singapore Exchange Mainboard-listed Company, established in 1988, the worldwide leader in the development and manufacture and sale of advanced, cutting edge, state-of-the-art evaluation, planning, cutting, shaping, polishing and grading systems for diamond and gemstone production, in a press release dated July 23, 2017 has announced the arrest in Tel Aviv of two suspects of Indian nationality, on suspicion of attempting to obtain illegally Sarine’s confidential intellectual property pertaining to Sarine’s fully automated GalaxyTM Systems.
According to the news release, a few months back some Sarine employees informed the management of the company that they had been approached by a third party who were keen in purchasing intellectual property pertaining to Sarine’s diamond manufacturing products.
Considering the seriousness of the information received, that compromised the confidentiality of the company’s intellectual property, Sarine Technologies Ltd. decided to engage the services of a private investigator to set up a trap to apprehend the alleged third party, interested in the company’s secrets. Accordingly, the private investigator playing the role of a decoy, continued to correspond with the said third party, posing as an employee of Sarine. Having gained the confidence of the third party after continued correspondence, an initial meeting was arranged between the investigator and the said third party to be held in Tel Aviv in June 2017. Two Indian nationals representing the third party, arrived in Israel in June, specifically to attend the said meeting with the investigator-cum-decoy. At this crucial meeting the two sides thrashed out the terms of a mutually acceptable deal, and a follow-up meeting was arranged for the second week of July 2017. According to this deal the two Indian nationals agreed to pay a sum of USD 1,000,000 in exchange for Sarine’s GalaxyTM system schematics, list of parts and vendors thereof and software source code. The payment was to be in two installments, the first installment being a sum of USD 100,000 in cash, as an advance payment and the balance to be paid immediately after receiving the requested intellectual property.
The second meeting was held as planned in July 2017, but was attended by only one Indian national who attended the previous meeting, and a relative of his, another Indian national residing in Israel, who is the owner of a company dealing in rough diamonds and a member of the Israel Diamond Bourse. As agreed the sum of USD 100,000 was handed over to the investigator-cum-decoy, by the two Indian nationals as advance payment, and the former promised to deliver the requested intellectual property in due course to complete the deal as promised.
Immediately after the money was handed over, Israeli Police detectives who were waiting in the sidelines, came forward and arrested the two suspects and took them into custody. Subsequently, the suspects were produced before the Tel Aviv Magistrate’s Court and the primary suspect was remanded into custody for 6 days pending further investigation. However, the suspects Israeli-based relative was released as the Court accepted his plea that although the money paid was his, he was not aware of the terms of the proposed deal. The Court also remarked that the presence of the second suspect at the meeting “smelled foul” but was not sufficient to establish complicity. The third suspect, the other Indian national who attended the first meeting in June, and known to have arrived in Israel with the first suspect, still remains at large, and is being sought by the Tel-Aviv police for questioning.
Commenting on these sensational developments, David Block, CEO of Sarine, stated that, “Sarine is fully committed to, and invests millions of dollars in the advancement of the diamond industry. We wish to reiterate that Sarine will aggressively defend its intellectual property in all places and at all times, with all the means that are necessary and appropriate. Unfortunately, this is another example of how far and how low unethical players will go to attain our technology illegally.”
Editor’s Note :- While appreciating Sarine’s commitment to aggressively defend its intellectual property with all the means at its disposal, as a positive fall out from these developments, Sarine Technologies Ltd. can now be justifiably proud of their achievement as the World’s true leader of developing and manufacturing cutting edge technologies for evaluation, planning, cutting, shaping, polishing and grading systems for diamond and gemstone production, which has now become the envy of its rival players, who would go to any extent to acquire their intellectual secrets legally or illegally, knowing very well Sarine’s technology is undoubtedly the best available in the world today !!!
