Dr. Mark White Sued by National Wooden Pallet & Container Association
February 7, 2010 by Rick LeBlanc
Filed under Latest News
Answering a question posed by an attendee at the WPA Annual Meeting this January, NWPCA president Bruce Scholnick confirmed that NWPCA filed a lawsuit on December 29 against Dr. Mark White, claiming that his BestLoad® software is an unlawful competitor to the NWPCA’s Pallet Design System (PDS). The lawsuit alleges copyright infringement, violation of Virginia’s trade secretes statute, unfair and deceptive trade practices, breach of fiduciary duty, and breach of contract. The NWPCA is asking for actual damages, lost profits, statutory damages, and punitive damages.
By way of background, packaging, pallet and material handling systems designers often make decisions that optimize their particular component of the unit load puzzle, but in so doing may sub-optimize the entire solution. BestLoad® is a software system offered by White and Company that takes a systems based approach to addressing this issue by optimizing design of packaging, pallet and shipping.
PDS or Pallet Design System is a software system that provides licensees with a quick and cost-effective tool to assist customers in optimizing pallet design. PDS has evolved over the course of many years, and for several of these, development took place through Virginia Tech with the aid of NWPCA funding. PDS is owned by NWPCA, and offers PDS licenses to interested NWPCA members.
Discussing the lawsuit by telephone late January with www.packagingrevolution.net, Dr. White stated that he believes the allegations made by NWPCA are without merit. He said that he has offered to arrange for a disinterested 3rd party to compare both products to prove there is no infringement, but has had no response as of yet from NWPCA.
He emphasized that the intended target market of BestLoad® is supply chain operators, in other words the designers of unit loads, rather than that of pallet companies, the target market of PDS. “We don’t want to compete with PDS,” he said, indicating that the few PDS licensees who had attended the webinar offered by White and Company intended to stick with PDS.
Dr. White commented that he has proposed a collaborative marketing approach for BestLoad® that could involve NWPCA, calling it a potential win-win scenario for NWPCA, its members, as well as White and Company.
“I hold no ill will towards the NWPCA or the NWPCA membership,” Dr. White stressed, saying that it continues to be his goal to support NWPCA. He added that he remains proud of his role in the development of PDS. He hopes to reach an amicable solution, and plans to move ahead with BestLoad® sales next month.
For more information on PDS, visit www.nwpca.com, or for BestLoad®, visit www.whiteandcompany.net.
