Technology service provider Ellie Mae responded with “surprise” last week to a cluster of antitrust and copyright lawsuits by mortgage document firm DocMagic, charging that it was actually DocMagic who broke the onetime partners’ agreement and violated Ellie Mae’s copyrights. “We are surprised and very disappointed that DocMagic has taken these drastic actions, particularly because of the obvious predictable negative impact that these actions have on DocMagic’s own customers,” said Jonathan Corr, chief strategy officer at Ellie Mae. “We are prepared to assist any customers who are affected, and are proactively working to minimize any inconveniences that DocMagic’s actions may be causing our mutual customers.” DS News reported last week on DocMagic’s allegations that Ellie Mae let DocMagic and its clients use Ellie Mae’s ePass online platform, but subsequently blocked DocMagic’s

access and pressured the company’s clients to use an Ellie Mae product instead. According to the suits it filed in San Francisco’s U.S. district court in late August, DocMagic also alleges that Ellie Mae used the layout and design of DocMagic to create its Encompass system, then cut out the middleman and drove clients to its own unauthorized version. Ellie Mae disputed that account, however. Instead, it insisted that is was DocMagic who made “unlawful attempts to induce Ellie Mae customers to breach their license agreements with Ellie Mae as well as… to reverse-engineer Ellie Mae’s technology and thereby gain access to Ellie Mae’s software, servers and network resources, in violation of Ellie Mae’s intellectual property rights.” Ellie Mae also said DocMagic’s sudden cessation of all business with Ellie Mae caused a “disruption to mutual customers and was unnecessary.” “This is about one vendor that is displeased to be losing the overly favorable terms it negotiated a long time ago, even after those terms had expired,” Corr said. “While we sincerely appreciate the services DocMagic provided to our mutual customers over the years, our customers’ business interests are our highest priority.” Ellie Mae said it would respond to DocMagic’s specific allegations “in the appropriate legal forum.” It also encouraged customers who were previously using DocMagic’s solutions to call Ellie Mae for assistance.