In this matter, martinsdelima acted as an independent economic expert to analyze and quantify the economic impact derived from unfair competition in which a former executive, together with a third party, would have stolen and used confidential information in order to replicate a business line of the affected company. The assignment consisted of translating a “conduct” conflict (appropriation of information and knowledge) into concrete, traceable, and defensible economic consequences.

The core of the case was not only the departure of the professional, but the use of accumulated knowledge and internal materials to set up a competing “cloned” unit and accelerate its entry into the market. In this context, the competitive advantage was not built from scratch, but from operating models, documentation, and strategic information that normally require years of investment and learning to consolidate.

Based on the documentation analyzed (including that incorporated in the complaint and associated expert reports), the report identified the most relevant damage mechanisms from an economic point of view: customer acquisition/transfer, copying of the business unit, use of data from current and potential customers, and recruitment of employees and associated knowledge/experience.

In parallel, a particularly sensitive element was addressed in cases of unfair competition: the internal organizational effect. When a unit suddenly loses part of the team and, simultaneously, a competitor appears with equivalent “know-how”, the impact is not limited to the customers who leave, but affects natural growth and the ability to continue developing the portfolio normally. This loss of traction, due to the need to recompose the structure and the pressure from a new “replicated” competitor, is one of the points where a solid economic analysis makes a difference.

With that framework, martinsdelima structured the quantification of the damage in clear and auditable items. Among others, damages for customer transfer, truncated business growth, replacement costs for loss of employees, and possible compensation linked to contractual clauses were considered. The objective was for each component to be supported by facts and economic relationships understandable to third parties, avoiding “black box” conclusions.

The methodology was based on a complete traceability approach:

(i) identification of the relevant facts and the material allegedly used;

(ii) design of a damage scheme consistent with those facts; and

(iii) separate quantification of the effects already materialized (actual damage) and of the effects on the activity that reasonably would have been generated in the absence of the conduct (loss of profit), in addition to the costs necessary to recompose the affected unit.

This approach allowed us to build a technically robust, orderly, and defensible report, which converts a complex case into a clear and well-founded economic claim.