FMC Technologie is taking legal action against its four former Norwegian employees claiming they have used FMC intellectual property in their new company.
It is understood FMC claims Optime has used technology for inventions it has patents pending.
The quartet formed Optime Subsea Services last year, which they established with subsea firm DeepOcean.
Optime chief executive, Jan-Fredrik Carlsen, who spent 12 years with FMC Technologies in Kongsberg, Norway in various technical and global leadership roles, said the lawsuit relates to four patent applications, filed by Optime.
Optime is a subsea services oil and gas company, in the completion, intervention/well access sector.
In a statement, Carlsen said: “Considering the technical solutions were started and therefore also reached, after the employment with FMC ended, as well as the technical details within the inventions are based upon publicly available information addressing industry known challenges, we can only adhere to the Norwegian judicial system and await addressing these matters as part of the court case.
“Out of respect to our former employer, we consciously avoided any solutions that may be in a potential conflict to FMC proprietary technology or know how, but rather investigated and leveraged inspiration and information from well documented and publicly available information.”
“We are a small startup company set out to challenge the current cost within the industry by use of more simplified operations and technology.
“We have limited resources so a lawsuit from a larger company with potential disproportional means is naturally challenging, but the crux of the matter is however with regards to the ownership of the four patent applications and this is something that is well regulated within the law.”
Carlsen said the company would be making no further comment on the matter.
The other three Optime management team members are chairman and chief operating officer Thor Arne Lovland, chief technology officer Trond Lokka and chief engineer Tor Oystein Carlsen, who all worked for FMC Technologies.
FMC Technologies has said it does not comment on ongoing legal matters.