Apple sues ex-employee and Oppo over Apple Watch trade secrets

Apple sued a former employee and smartphone maker Oppo on Thursday, alleging that the employee downloaded and transferred confidential Apple Watch files to benefit a new role at Oppo before leaving the company in June. The complaint, filed in federal court in San Jose, California, names former Sensor System Architect Chen Shi, Guangdong Oppo Mobile Telecommunications and California-based InnoPeak, and seeks an injunction and damages tied to alleged misappropriation of trade secrets related to Apple Watch health sensors.

According to the complaint, Shi worked on the Apple Watch team from January 2020 until June 2025 and began pursuing employment with Oppo as early as April 2025. Apple alleges Shi concealed his plans to join a competitor by telling colleagues he was returning to China to care for elderly parents and had no plans to seek new work. The filing says that in the month before his departure Shi scheduled dozens of one-on-one meetings with team members on projects he was not assigned to, and then, three days before leaving, downloaded 63 files from a protected company folder and copied them to a USB drive.

Apple characterizes the downloaded materials as highly...