Thread by @senamisomoyo

Welcome to another edition of #IPThursday. Its part 3 and last of the Cola Wars. This one is really something out of a heist movie. It involved the theft of IP, an FBI agent and a criminal case. At its core, this is a lesson of what can happen if you expose trade secrets.

Lets pick it up from the beginning again. In 1886, a man named John Pemberton blended syrup with carbonated water, coca, other extracts and even cocaine to make what we know now as Coca-Cola.

He went through some tough times financially, so just two years later he sold the recipe to Asa Candler for about $2k. Candler started distributing the drink throughout the US, and the rest is history!

Candler changed Pemberton’s recipe slightly. He removed cocaine and made it better in general. The Coke recipe has remained a closely guarded secret since. It is stored in a heavily guarded vault at the Coke headquarters. Dramatic much.

It is so closely protected that only two people have access to it at any given time and they have to travel on separate flights in case of accidents. It is probably the most guarded trade secret in the world and why not? Its the greatest soft drink ever made.

Lemme just explain what trade secrets are. Very often there are certain creations that don’t qualify for protection as Patents because they don’t meet certain requirements. Recipes, business processes and certain formulas usually fall into this category.

So the best way to protect them is to keep them secret and make everyone in that organisation sign Non-Disclosure Agreements (NDAs). That way, any leak of that information would be a breach of the NDA and potentially a criminal offence in some countries.

Another of a recipe protected by way of a trade secret is the KFC recipe. They’ve taken people to court over their recipe, but thats a story for another IP Thursday.

Back to our story, I’m sure we all know about the Cola Wars now. Coke and Pepsi have been at each other’s throats for years. From taking out aggressive adverts against each other, to suing each other in court. There is no love lost between these two and the world knows it.

This brings us to the star of our story this week, a woman named Joya Williams. Joya was the daughter of a church deacon and she worked at Coke as an administrative assistant to an Exec from around 2005.

By all accounts, she was everything you needed in a company protecting the world’s most valuable recipe. I mean if my company deals in very sensitive information, I’d also hire a church deacon’s daughter.

But somewhere along the line, something changed. If you ever did Business Studies at school, you’d know how important employee motivation is. For whatever reason, Joya fell out of love with Coke.

So she came up with a plan, but not just any plan. Joya decided to plan a heist and steal Coca-Cola trade secrets. If you’ve watched Money Heist or Fast 5, you’re probably familiar with what goes into a heist. The first step, is to assemble a perfect team.

So Joya did just that. She met with the second star of our story, a man named Edmund Duhaney. Edmund, was an ex convict and he’d just got out of jail. As you know, every heist has an inside man and ex convict, its industry tradition!

Joya told Edmund that she could get access to tons of very confidential information at Coca Cola that they could sell for millions. Edmund was keen and why not, he had 3 kids, a criminal record and no job, so he really needed the money.

So the next step in any heist is to recruit another person, usually the tech guy or a guy who can blend into corporate. Enter a man named Ibrahim Dimson, the missing piece. Edmund had met Ibrahim in prison had experience in embezzlement and white collar crimes. The team was set.

The plan was simple, they would steal Coke trade secrets and sell them off to Pepsi for millions. Everyone knew about the Cola Wars and just how much these companies hates each other. So surely Pepsi would pay top dollar for the info?

Ibrahim, under the fake name “Dirk” decided to send a letter to Pepsi. It had an official letterhead and everything. Ibrahim (Dirk) said that he had confidential trade secrets and even products that weren’t released yet, for the next 4 years.

Fast forward 2 weeks, our trio got a response from Pepsi, they were down with the heist. The Pepsi employee was man named Jerry. Jerry said Pepsi was interested and asked for proof. So Joya sent them 14 documents, all marked confidential or highly restricted.

They asked for money, just to see if Pepsi were really serious about the heist. So Jerry sent through some money and in exchange, they would send more trade secrets.

So with the promise of more money. Joya got busy, busier than the video vixens in Sean Paul’s song. She stole all sorts of Coke trade secrets, info on new products and business plans. Edmund and Ibrahim took the documents sold them to Jerry for $75k.

Over several months in 2006, Jerry from Pepsi would meet up with our crew, pay them money and they would give him trade secrets. It was the perfect plan, until it all went wrong.....

In most of the times they had dealt with Jerry, the trio had provided info in exchange for a few thousand bucks. But now they wanted to take the heist to the next level. Jerry called Ibrahim and offered the trio $1,5million for the rest of the trade secrets.

This was going to be a huge pay day so they met with Jerry. After agreeing with Jerry to sell him the trade secrets, Edmund and Ibrahim were in for a huge shock......

It turned out that Jerry, was FBI agent Gerald Reichard “Gerry” and he arrested the 2 men. He was working undercover the whole time. Joya Williams was arrested a bit later.

I know, H for Hectic!!! Lets rewind to the beginning a little. It turns out that when Ibrahim sent the letter claiming to be a Coke employee, Pepsi read it and sent it straight to Coca-Cola. They told them that they have a mole in the company leaking trade secrets for money.

When Coke found out, they contacted the FBI and got Agent Gerald “Jerry” Reichard involved. So all the money they were getting, was from the Feds, all the meetings were with a Fed and for months, they leaked confidential trade secrets to the Feds.

When the investigation started, Coke installed cameras by Joya’s office and everything she did was monitored. The FBI had videos of all the times she snuck documents into her bag. It was a proper mess.

All 3 were charged with conspiracy to commit theft of trade secrets. Yes kids, stealing trade secrets is a criminal offense. Ibrahim Dimson pleaded guilty and got 5 years.

Edmund Duhaney pleaded guilty and entered into a plea agreement with the State......he would testify (snitch) against Joya Williams in exchange for just 2 years.

Joya Williams cried, pleaded and begged for mercy but it didn’t work.The Judge told her that “This is the kind of offense that cannot be tolerated in our society.” She was sentenced to 8 years in prison. Her relationship with Coke immediately “fizzled” out. Get it, fizzled?

So why didn’t Pepsi do what 90% of you would have definitely done, take the trade secrets and use them to win the Cola Wars. Well Pepsi said that competition must always be fair and they had a responsibility to do the right thing....Ethics>Profit.

In any event, the truth has a way of coming out and if the trio were ever caught and linked to Pepsi, the implications for them would have been worse. Probably not worth it.

Big Lesson: A lot of you guys work for companies that have trade secrets. And a lot of you have signed NDAs not to disclose any confidential information. Take that very seriously, a breach of an NDA and leaking trade secrets, can land you in jail. ❤️💛💚

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