Delta Wing files lawsuit against Nissan, and former designer Ben Bowlby
A lawsuit has been filed by Delta Wing against Nissan and former designer Ben Bowlby for the new Nissan ZEOD project and its design.
#0 DeltaWing Racing Cars DeltaWing LM12 Elan: Andy Meyrick, Katherine Legge
Eric Gilbert
Delta Wing has filed a lawsuit against Ben Bowlby, the designer of the Delta Wing and the team’s former engine-supplier Nissan.
The issue at hand is the fact that Bowlby, who was a chief designer on the Delta Wing project, and Nissan have released and held demonstration laps for another radical race car design, very similar to that of the Delta Wing, the Nissan ZEOD.
The ZEOD was given the nod as the Garage 56 eligible car for the 2014 24 Hours of Daytona, a program for new designs and concepts to take part in the historic race, in a non-points paying manner.
The complaint involves many parties who are involved in the ZEOD project, including its designer Bowlby.
Delta Wing, led by Don Panoz says Bowlby, Nissan and those involved in the ZEOD project used confidential information the designer had from his Delta Wing designs for this project with the Japanese manufacturer.
A part of Bowlby’s contract with both Chip Ganassi Racing, who is the owner of the Delta Wing LLC, was that any designs he created for the racing team and its subsidiaries would remain with the team under its intellectual copyrights, even after his departure.
Bowlby’s Delta Wing was originally submitted to replace the old IndyCar Dallara, but was turned down before work began to get it on track with the sports car ranks worldwide.
The various allegations are everything from Bowlby’s breach of contract to fraud on the part of Bowlby, Nissan and Nissan’s global motorsports director Darren Cox.
More on this story as it unfolds.
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