It appears that the saga of Mark Papermaster has finally come to an end, as Apple announced on Tuesday that the former IBM vice president would officially be taking his post as senior vice president of devices hardware engineering, beginning on April 24.
Furthermore, Apple says the court case between IBM and Apple over Papermaster's employment has been resolved.
Papermaster was tapped in October to succeed outgoing Apple executive Tony Fadell, who had previously headed up the iPod hardware division. Unfortunately, IBM took issue with the new job, arguing that Papermaster was forbidden from taking the position under a non-compete agreement that he had signed with IBM.
Papermaster was sued by his former employer, which said that he had access to trade secrets and other information that could harm IBM.
In November, US District Judge Kenneth Karas issued an injunction requiring Papermaster to immediately stop working at Apple. Papermaster subsequently countersued his former employer, arguing that IBM and Apple were not significant competitors.
An IBM veteran of 26 years, Papermaster had served in a number of different capacities at the company, most recently as vice president of IBM's blade server development unit. At Apple, his new position will put him in charge of the hardware engineering for the iPod and iPhone.