VMware Inc. has filed a lawsuit against former executive Rajiv Ramaswami, who joined rival software maker Nutanix Inc. earlier this month, for alleged “material and ongoing breaches of his legal and contractual duties.”

The Dell Technologies Inc. subsidiary detailed the complaint in a statement released Monday.

Ramaswami joined VMware in 2016 after stints at Broadcom Inc., Cisco Systems Inc. and IBM Corp.’s research group. The executive’s most recent role at VMware was chief operating officer. The context behind the newly filed lawsuit is that Nutanix, the virtualization giant’s top rival in the hyperconverged infrastructure market, named Ramaswami as president and chief executive officer earlier this month. 

VMware said in its statement that Ramaswami “had a clear and extended period of conflict of interest” prior to taking on the new role. The executive, the Dell subsidiary claims, secretly met with Nutanix leaders for at least two months before resigning while at the same time continuing to work with VMware colleagues to shape “key strategic vision and direction” details. 

“He should have disclosed this conflict of interest to VMware so that the company could have taken steps to protect itself,” the virtualization giant said in its statement. “But he did not notify VMware, and thus deprived the company of the ability to do so by concealing his Nutanix-related activities.”

The company added: “VMware is not a litigious company by nature. Indeed, the company tried to resolve this matter without litigation. But Mr. Ramaswami and Nutanix refused to engage with VMware in a satisfactory manner.”

Nutanix responded to the development with a statement of its own. “VMware’s lawsuit seeks to make interviewing for a new job wrongful,” the company told TechCrunch. “We view VMware’s misguided action as a response to losing a deeply valued and respected member of its leadership team. Mr. Ramaswami and Nutanix have gone above and beyond to be proactive and cooperative with VMware throughout the transition.” 

Photo: Dell Technologies/Flickr