English Translation of a requête aux fins de mesures d’instruction (industrial espionage case)

In the context of litigation between an automotive supplier and one of its former engineers, our team was tasked with translating from French into English a requête aux fins de mesures d’instruction, based on Article 145 of the French Code de procédure civile.

⚖️ Context: inventions, departure, and suspicions

The employee in question, author of numerous inventions de mission under his employment contract, had left the company to join a foreign competitor.

Evidence suggested that he may have personally transferred données et informations confidentielles using his private email address, raising suspicions of potential industrial espionage.

🎯 Purpose of the requête: preserving evidence

The former employer petitioned the court for mesures d’instruction in futurum aimed at identifying and preserving proof of this transfer of sensitive information, in light of an imminent risque de dépérissement de la preuve.

The challenge lay in faithfully rendering a highly technical judicial application that combined elements of evidence law, employment law, intellectual property, and protection of individual rights.

📌 Key contextual equivalents

• requête aux fins de mesures d’instruction → application for investigative measures

• demandes de brevets d’invention → patent applications

• inventions de mission → service inventions

• données et informations confidentielles → confidential data and information

• boîte mail professionnelle/personnelle → professional/personal email address

• respect de la vie privée → respect for privacy

• risque imminent de dépérissement de la preuve → imminent risk of the evidence being destroyed