Nevada judge slaps Zer01 with $43 million judgment

IDG News Service - Global Verge, a multilevel marketing firm, has won a $43 million judgment against Zer01, a company that once promised to deliver an unlimited voice and data cell phone service.

Last Thursday, a judge in the District Court in Clark County, Nevada, ordered that Zer01 and Ben Piilani, the company's CEO, pay more than $43 million for breach of contract, tortious interference with contractual relations and long-term profit losses, said Brian Hardy, a lawyer with Marquis & Aurbach representing Global Verge.

He's not confident that Global Verge will be able to receive much of the award. "We may never collect against it," Hardy said. "My guess is Zer01 goes completely under, if they're not already, and we end up collecting probably nothing."

The court must still sign the order and then Piilani and Zer01 have 20 days to file an appeal. Prior to Thursday's ruling, Piilani's lawyer had withdrawn after he stopped replying to contact from his counsel, Hardy said.

Hardy has sent documents via certified mail to Piilani's address and the documents have not been returned, meaning someone is there receiving them, Hardy said. But Piilani has stopped participating in the case, he said.

If there is no appeal, Hardy will begin looking into what assets Zer01 and Piilani have that might allow his client to collect on at least some of the judgment. For instance, Hardy said that Piilani has shown him copies of a patent that he claims Zer01 has applied for. "He showed us the patent applications but anyone can pull together that without filing it so we don't know how much of that is legitimate," Hardy said.

Global Verge filed the suit late last year charging breach of contract and claiming that it had loaned Zer01 more than $170,000 to assist in getting the business running.

People began signing up to a Global Verge sales program last year to sell Zer01's mobile service. Zer01 said it would launch the service last July but hasn't. Its Web site mostly disappeared earlier this year. It is not clear who to contact at Zer01 for comment about the lawsuit.

Even though Global Verge won this lawsuit, it continues to be the subject of complaints online from people who say they have signed up to sell mobile products as part of the multilevel marketing plan. People sign up to the sales program by paying a monthly fee in exchange for back-office support. Some say that they have paid their monthly fees and signed up other sales people or customers but have not been paid for their work. Others say that they have canceled their involvement in the program but continue to be charged the monthly fee.