Michelle ThompsonHP’s lawyers told the top court that the software company’s co-founder Mike Lynch falsely inflated its value.
Hewlett-Packard lost more than $4 billion (£3.2 billion) on its acquisition of British software firm Autonomy as a result of an intricate scam orchestrated by co-founder Mike Lynch to inflate the company’s value, its lawyers told a London court on Monday.
Hewlett-Packard Enterprise (HPE) is suing Lynch, once dubbed Britain’s Bill Gates, and Sushovan Hussain, Autonomy’s former chief financial officer, to collect losses.
In 2011, the US technology company purchased Autonomy for $11.1 billion in one of the UK’s largest technology transactions. However, the transaction failed catastrophically, with HPE writing down Autonomy’s worth by $8.8 billion within a year.
After one of the longest civil lawsuits in English legal history, HPE won its case in 2022, albeit a high court judge ruled that any damages would be far less than the $5 billion HPE demanded.
HPE’s lawyers said on Monday that its losses from the scam are worth approximately $4 billion.
However, Lynch, who was extradited to the United States last year to face criminal charges in connection with the transaction, claims HPE suffered no genuine loss. A trial is scheduled to begin next month. He denies all misconduct.
In court filings, his lawyer, David Wolfson, stated that the price HPE would have paid “would not have been materially different” due to Autonomy’s unique technology and HPE’s strategic rationale for the acquisition.
Lynch’s lawyers have previously stated that he expects to seek permission to appeal the 2022 verdict, which has been delayed until after the determination of damages.
Lawyers for Hussain, who was convicted of fraud in the United States and sentenced to five years in prison in 2019, said he agreed with Lynch’s case.
