WallStreetJournalStarwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide Inc. on Thursday sued Hilton Hotels Corp. and two former Starwood executives for allegedly stealing confidential information used to help Hilton quickly and cheaply enter the lifestyle luxury-hotel market.
Starwood filed suit in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, alleging that former Starwood executives Ross Klein and Amar Lalvani stole "truckloads of documents" later used by Hilton to enter the lifestyle hotel market and "reposition its luxury brands and substantially reduce its costs and risks of doing so." White Plains, N.Y.-based Starwood alleges that Hilton recruited Klein and Lalvani in June of last year, after Hilton was acquired by private equity firm Blackstone Group , and stole the documents both before and after they joined Hilton.
"Among the stolen materials was confidential information about Starwood's W(R) hotel brand, which Hilton used in the development of its Denizen brand," Starwood said.
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