A former software engineer for IBM in China pleaded guilty on May 19 to stealing proprietary source code from the company, federal prosecutors announced on May 19.
Jiaqiang Xu, 31, pleaded guilty to economic espionage and theft of a trade secret before US District Judge Kenneth Karas in White Plains, New York, prosecutors said. He is scheduled to be sentenced on Oct 13.
Leanne Marek, Xu’s attorney, declined to comment.
Xu was arrested in December 2015 after meeting with an undercover officer at a White Plains hotel, where authorities said he was recorded saying he used the code to make software to sell to customers.
He was originally charged with theft of a trade secret. The economic espionage charges were added in a superseding indictment filed last June.