The Supreme Court in Taiwan has upheld a ruling that a former employee of Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) leaked secrets about the company's 28nm process technology to Samsung, according to EETimes.

Liang Mong-song, a former senior director of R&D at TSMC's Advanced Modules Technology Division, worked for the company for 17 years before resigning to “spend time with his parents” and teach, according to CommonWealth Magazine , which suggested that Liang's resignation stemmed from his dissatisfaction with TSMC after he was passed up for a promotion. When he resigned, Liang signed a non-compete agreement that would have forced him to forfeit half of the stock he received as a bonus from TSMC if he found employment with a competitor within two years of his resignation.

TSMC later discovered that Liang was teaching at Sungkyunkwan University, a private research university which has ties with Samsung. But after reassurances from Liang that nothing untoward was happening, TSMC paid out Liang's bonus after two years. In 2011, once that payout was complete, Liang became Samsung's System LSI division chief technology officer.

TSMC sued Liang twice and won both times, with the second of the two favorable decisions coming in spring 2014. The court at the time ruled that Liang would have to quit his job at Samsung and could not work for that company until December 31, 2015 to protect TSMC's trade secrets. The ruling was, apparently, an unprecedented one against an executive whose non-compete contract had been acknowledged as expired. The higher court affirmed that decision. TSMC has not sued Samsung directly, although it hinted to EETimes that it may file more lawsuits against Liang in the future.

TSMC alleged that Liang's leak of its 28nm process designs helped Samsung gain a competitive edge more quickly than it would have otherwise and use that know-how to move forward with next-generation processes. But of course, the chip arms race can be challenging to follow—in 2014, Apple switched from using Samsung as a supplier to relying on TSMC, but in 2015, Qualcomm decided to scuttle its production of its Snapdragon processors at TSMC in favor of a deal with Samsung.