Mark Papermaster, formerly known as IBM’s Vice President of Microprocessor Technology Development, got hired by Apple. Papermaster was employed with IBM for the last 26 years, where he was actively involved in the development of the Power PC architecture and IBM’s Blade Server.

IBM now filed a lawsuit against Papermaster. They say he breaks his IBM work contract. IBM says the contract includes a term that disallows Papermaster to work with a competitive company like Apple within a period of  12 months after quitting.

Papermaster is indended to be the successor of Tony Fadell at Apple. Fadell was the Senior Vice President of the iPod Development Unit, thus reporting directly to Steve Jobs.