Move Inc., a provider of real estate websites such as Realtor.com (the website for the National Association of Realtors [NAR]), has filed a lawsuit against Zillow Inc. and Errol Samuelson in the Superior Court of King County, Wash., for breach of contract, breach of fiduciary duty and misappropriation of trade secrets, among others actions.
NAR and its subsidiary Realtors Information Network Inc. joined as plaintiffs in the suit.
Recently, Samuelson was named chief industry development officer of Zillow. He previously served as president of Realtor.com since 2007 and was appointed chief strategy officer of Move in 2013, after having joined in 2003.
‘At Move, we take our trade secrets and intellectual property extremely seriously as a valuable asset in our competitive position in the marketplace,’ says Steve Berkowitz, CEO of Move. ‘We take action in cases in which we believe our trade secrets have been compromised. We have raised this matter for the courts and believe that the matter will be resolved judiciously.’
Meanwhile, Zillow has appointed a new vice president of industry development: Curt Beardsley, who is former executive vice president of industry development at Move.
At the beginning of March, Beardsley was promoted to this position at Move after Samuelson resigned from the company.
Zillow says Beardsley will be responsible for building and strengthening Zillow's relationships with multiple listing services (MLSs) and other industry partners.
Prior to Move, Beardsley founded True North Technology in 1994, where he developed and deployed the first major Internet-based MLS system in the U.S., according to Zillow.