Travelport has filed a lawsuit against former employee Jennifer Catto, claiming she violated a noncompete agreement when she resigned and took a job with Sabre.
The lawsuit was filed Feb. 13 in U.S. District Court in Atlanta. Travelport said Catto, who was its chief marketing officer and interim chief product officer, had agreed to "a noncompete, a nondisclosure covenant, a nonsolicitation covenant and an employee nonrecruitment covenant" when she accepted her post in July 2020.
According to the lawsuit, Catto's noncompete agreement restricted her from providing similar services to a competitor, becoming an employee of a competitor, or developing a competing business for 12 months following her last day of employment with Travelport. Sabre was listed as a competitor. She also agreed not to share confidential information and not to solicit customers.
Travelport claims that Catto "resigned from Travelport under a cloud of deception" in January and "immediately" joined Sabre as its chief marketing officer.
"Her intimate knowledge of Travelport's operations will give Sabre a tremendous, and unfair, competitive advantage in the highly competitive segment of the travel industry known as global distribution systems," Travelport said in the lawsuit.
Travelport claims Catto violated the terms of her noncompetition covenants. The company also claims she sent confidential information about Travelport to her personal email address and "repeatedly made misrepresentations to Travelport employees about what she was going to do when she left Travelport."
Travelport is seeking injunctive relief from the court barring Catto from violating the agreements she signed when she was hired, repayment of an $85,500 retention payment plus interest, a judgement against Catto in an amount to be determined during trial, the return of any Travelport property in Catto's possession and attorneys' fees that are estimated will "exceed $75,000."
Travel Weekly contacted Travelport and Sabre requesting comment. Sabre declined to comment on the litigation.
This story was first reported by The Beat, Travel Weekly's sister publication.