Hartford Business Journal

www.HartfordBusiness.com • May 7, 2018 • Hartford Business Journal 17 ing discussed and seal portions of the record. At a hearing this month that was not closed to the public, attorneys were still hashing out ground rules for sharing notebooks containing chemis- try formulas. The suit claims Samet Dy became "increasingly dissatisfied with the direction in which management was taking the company and increasingly angrier about the manner in which the company treated him." The complaint doesn't provide further details about the nature of the disagreement. Shortly before resigning from Dur-A-Flex in 2013, Dy formed A&E ProCoat, which was created with "the intent to enter the same marketplace" as Dur-A-Flex, the lawsuit alleges. A&E ProCoat sold infringing prod- ucts to Dur-A-Flex customers, court records said. Assisted by his nephew, Samet Dy developed several flooring products — Epi-Thane, Eco-Krete and Am-Poxy — that Dur-A-Flex says were made using its proprietary formulas or methods. The suit says Samet Dy then pro- vided certain processes, products and formulas to a number of companies — Merrifield Paint Co., ProRez, Durafloor and Engineered Coatings — that had reason to believe they were receiving a competitor's intellectual property, the lawsuit alleges. Engineered Coatings had previ- ously been a Dur-A-Flex customer, but stopped buying their products after working with the Dys as well as other defendants, the complaint says. Samet Dy's attorney, who also rep- resents Josh Dy, did not respond to a request for comment. Dur-A-Flex's at- torney, Rogin Nassau's Lawrence Rosen- thal, declined comment for this story. Jonathan M. Shapiro, an attorney for Engineered Coatings, Krone, Dura- floor, ProRez and Lipman, said his clients deny the allegations. "The claims have no merit," Shapiro told HBJ. "This is simply an attempt to restrict lawful competition." Meanwhile, Merrifield Paint Co. also introduced competing products after working with the Dys, the suit says. An attorney for Merrifield did not respond to a request for comment. Samet Dy later became a consul- tant for Indue, which Dur-A-Flex says previously had a chemist who tried unsuccessfully to develop a competing urethane cement flooring product. In- due, however, launched "Indue-Crete" not long after Samet Dy began work- ing with the company, the suit said. "Despite never having formulated and marketed its own competing product previously, Indue is now mar- keting and selling competing products in Connecticut, as well as nationwide," the suit says. " … Samet was able to provide Indue with a viable starting formulation in just a few months fol- lowing the execution of his consulting agreement, which Indue began mar- keting and selling shortly thereafter." Halloran & Sage's Joseph G. Fortner Jr., who is representing Indue, told HBJ his client "strongly denies" Dur- A-Flex's accusations and believes it will be vindicated in court. "We believe that the claims asserted have no merit and that their trade- secret claims are overstated," Fortner said, characterizing Dur-A-Flex's suit as "anti-competitive." Government Total revenue (2015) $49,251,423 Per capita tax $2,598 Total expenditures $48,109,974 Total indebtedness $13,896,565 as % of expenditures 28.9% Annual debt service $2,809,443 Moody's Bond Rating Aa1 Actual Mill Rate 26.23 Net Grand List $1,218,347,021 Housing stock Existing units 5,295 % single unit 71% New permits (2015) 23 as % of existing units 0.4% Demolitions 1 Residential sales 116 Median price $195,800 Top 5 grand list Company Amount Ean Holdings LLC $46.4M Hamilton Sunstrand Corp. $37.8M Hertz Vehicles LLC $29.8M PV Holding Corp. $29.3M Areh Windsor Locks LLC $22.1M Town Profile Windsor Locks Town Hall address: 50 Church Street, Windsor Locks, CT 06096 (860) 627-1444 News Around Town ■ ■ In April, Serta Simmons Bedding moved more than 240 workers to begin producing mattresses at its new 268,000-square-foot Windsor Locks factory, at 140 Old County Circle. ■ ■ In February it was announced Collins Aerospace Systems' Power and Controls division will be located at UTC Aerospace Systems' Windsor Locks plant. ■ ■ Windsor Locks lags behind Connecticut when it comes to college- educated residents: 23.3 percent of its population (ages 25 and older) holds a bachelor's degree or higher. The statewide average is 37.5 percent. General Land area (sq. miles) 9 sq. mi. Households 1,393 Median household income $68,944 Poverty Rate 5.7% Crime Rate (per 100,000 residents) 2,015 Population 2000 12,043 Projected 2020 12,556 Median age 43 Largest age demographic 45-64 (30%) Educational attainment (2012) Persons age 25 or older % of population High school graduate 36% Associate's Degree 10% Bachelor's or more 23% Labor Force (Residence) Employed 6,929 Unemployed 407 Unemployment Rate 5.5% Place of work # of units 464 Total Employment 12,614 Economics Business profile (2013) Sector Units Employ- ment Construction 38 401 Manufacturing 21 3,852 Wholesale Trade 34 942 Retail Trade 35 328 Transportation and Warehousing 63 2,399 Accommodation and Food Services 48 1,007 Total government 22 1,529 Top 5 employers • UTC Aerospace Systems • Ahlstroms Nonwovens LLC • Bombardier Aerospace • C&S Wholesale Grocers Inc. • Health New England Source: Connecticut Economic Resource Center Dur-A-Flex's 2010 win Dur-A-Flex is no stranger to drawn-out litigation. The company fought its last big case between 2006 and 2010, which was capped off by a two- month jury trial. The jury eventu- ally awarded Dur-A-Flex nearly $44 million, plus five years worth of royalty payments, $5.9 million in attorney fees and $395,000 in other costs. Dur-A-Flex accused the de- fendant, Bethany-based Laticrete International, of lifting its pro- cesses for producing a colored- sand product. Laticrete had been a longtime Dur-A-Flex customer, and one of Laticrete's scientists visited the Dur-A-Flex plant many times. In 2004, Laticrete began producing its own colored sand, using what a jury ultimately decided were Dur-A-Flex's trade secrets. The secrets in question in- volved processes or components for making the sand as well as the temperature at which the sand was heated. Dur-A-Flex President Peter Ferris picks up a bag of Poly-Crete, a flooring coating at the heart of a trade-secrets lawsuit.

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