Two former employees of Washington-based Helium Financial Group LLC stole trade secrets and used them to start their own wealth management firm after they were fired, allowing them to create "a 'clone' of Helium's business model in startup form," Helium claimed in a lawsuit filed Wednesday in Seattle federal court

Days after Helium fired Roshan Weeramantry and Cyrus Amini in July, the company alleged, the pair launched Hyphen Wealth Management LLC. The California-based startup then used Helium's trade secrets and other confidential information to woo Helium clients, according to the company's complaint.

Weeramantry, a former partner, senior adviser and co-head of wealth management at Helium, had access to the firm's entire client database as well as proprietary data sets, financial metrics and internal formulas and algorithms, Helium claimed. It alleges that Weeramantry used Helium's recently developed initiative called Brightline, which he briefly oversaw while at the firm, to intercept clients and benefit Hyphen instead.

"Brightline's entire creation and its individual components are confidential trade secrets that would confer a significant advantage on any competitor able to gain access to its insights without the expenditure of time and resources," Helium said. It was designed to acquire and manage outside partnerships between the company and external advisers and influencers, the company said, adding that the model "is novel to the industry and its components are not commonly known."

Helium Financial and subsidiary Helium Advisors LLC are seeking to claw back profits that the defendants made through their alleged improper use of its intellectual property and collect additional, unspecified damages. They also want the court to bar the defendants from using Helium's confidential information going forward.

The company further seeks an order preserving all of Helium's digital or hard-copy information controlled by the defendants, including client and vendor information, Dropbox files, emails and text messages.

Amini, who was Helium's chief investment officer, didn't return his company laptop for almost two weeks after he was terminated, the company claimed. Helium sent him a letter in September demanding that he provide the login credentials for the laptop, but he allegedly replied that he didn't have the credentials and that they may have been destroyed along with other documentation.

"Helium believes Amini destroyed this information in his efforts to deprive Helium from accessing his computer," the company said, adding that it believes Amini "retained valuable work product on that machine related to several projects that Helium is now unable to access."

Helium claimed the defendants violated laws protecting trade secrets, including Washington's Uniform Trade Secrets Act and the federal Defend Trade Secrets Act. They also allegedly broke the terms of their employment contracts with Helium and interfered with the company's business relationships.

Amini is a South Carolina resident and a lawyer licensed in New York, Helium said. The company claimed that he and Weeramantry added Helium as a defendant when they negotiated a settlement involving investments Weeramantry allegedly sold while at RINA Wealth Management Services LLC, where he worked prior to joining Helium in 2022.

Signed by Weeramantry in May, the settlement agreement identified Helium as a defendant in the dispute even though the company was not named in the complaint and was never notified of the negotiations or provided with a draft of the settlement, Helium said in the suit. It added that Weeramantry lacked authority to sign the agreement on the company's behalf.

Helium's chief compliance officer and a founding partner of the firm didn't discover the company had been added as a defendant in that matter until July, the company alleged, claiming it fired Weeramantry and Amini shortly thereafter.

Helium claimed in the new suit that it's not the first time Weeramantry has been accused of misappropriating trade secrets, pointing to a California state lawsuit the company said was filed against him by RINA in 2022. The suit settled later that year, Helium said, with Weeramantry and another party required to pay RINA a confidential amount of money.

Counsel for Helium did not respond to requests for comment Wednesday. Partners at the company also did not immediately respond. Weeramantry did not immediately respond to a phone message, and Amini did not immediately respond to a message on LinkedIn.

Helium Financial Group LLC and Helium Advisors LLC are represented by Steven W. Fogg and Todd T. Williams of Corr Cronin LLP, James S. Rollins and P. John Veysey of Nelson Mullins Riley & Scarborough LLP and Patrice M. Kreider-Hughes of Kreider Hughes Law PLLC.

Counsel information for the defendants was not immediately available.

The case is Helium Financial Group LLC et al. v. Roshan Weeramantry et al., case number 2:25-cv-02198, in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington.