Recent reports had confirmed that Benjamin Hoyle will not be joining Ferrari for the time being.
“Ferrari has stressed the point Benjamin Hoyle never had a contract with the company, so he will not be joining us in the foreseeable future,” a spokesperson said as quoted from Autosport.
Mercedes-Benz AMG High Performance Powertrains (HPP) had taken legal action against engineer Benjamin Hoyle yesterday, for alleged data theft ahead of a move to their rival Scuderia Ferrari.
Hoyle, whom was employed in December 2012 as one of the four team leaders in the engineering department, was accused of gathering confidential data of the team prior to settling his move to Ferrari next year.
HPP had demanded Hoyle to hand over all the related documents in order to prevent him using any of the information. Hoyle is also responsible in paying off the costs for investigation, legal fees and compensation.
It is said that Hoyle had searched for and saved confidential information of Formula One through various means. The information included this year’s Hungarian Grand Prix race report, mileage and damage data relating to HPP’s F1 engines and also files that contain the code to decrypt raw race data files.
The talks between Hoyle and Ferrari were nothing serious as no paperwork had been done and no promises had been. Mercedes had suggested that both Hoyle and Ferrari may have potentially gained an unlawful advantage.
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