Ex-Broadcom worker charged with theft

Former engineer faces accusations of stealing trade secrets

SAN JOSE >> A 50-year-old Ben Lomond man has been charged with stealing trade secrets from his previous employer, San Jose-based Broadcom, according to federal prosecutors.

Peter Kisang Kim is charged with 18 counts of trade secret theft, according to an indictment filed Nov. 4 and unsealed Tuesday.

If convicted, Kim faces up to 10 years in prison, a $250,000 fine and three years of supervised release for each count.

According to the indictment, Kim worked as a principal design engineer at Broadcom, a semiconductor manufacturing company, and had been employed by the firm since 2020.

In the days before his July 17, 2020, departure from Broadcom, Kim stole trade secrets associated with a family of chips often used in high-volume data centers, the indictment alleges. The secrets were stored in non-public depositories that were restricted to employees within the same subgroup or to employees working on a project.

According to the indictment, the trade secrets included test plans, design verification environment files and design specifications for the firm’s Trident family of networking chips.

About 10 days before Kim left Broadcom, he started working at the director level for a China-based startup company focused on chip design and the market for networking chips.

Kim possessed and repeatedly used the stolen trade secrets on a laptop issued by his new employer over the next nine months, the indictment alleges.

On Tuesday, Kim made his initial appearance in federal court in San Jose, where he entered a plea of not guilty.

He was released on a $500,000 bond and was ordered to surrender his passport and other travel documents. His next court appearance is Jan. 31.