I-Admin (Singapore) Pte Ltd v Hong Ying Ting 6 [2020] SGCA 32 There are four respondents (GD at [4]): (a) The first respondent is Mr Hong Ying Ting, a former employee of the appellant. (b) The second respondent is Mr Liu Jia Wei, a former employee of I-Admin (Shanghai). (c) The third respondent is Nice Payroll Pte Ltd, a Singapore- incorporated company that provides payroll outsourcing services and HR management functions. (d) The fourth respondent is Mr Li Yong, a national of the People’s Republic of China and Singapore permanent resident who invested in the third respondent. The appellant is not pursuing its claims against the fourth respondent. Unless otherwise specified, references to “the respondents” shall relate to the first, second and third respondents only. Background 7 The first respondent joined the appellant in 2001. He found the appellant’s software, in particular its payroll calculation engine, flawed and inadequate for the tasks it had to perform. The appellant’s calculation engine computes the components of its clients’ monthly employee remuneration such as basic salary, overtime pay, bonuses, Central Provident Fund (“CPF”) payments and so on. Sometime in 2009, the first respondent expressed his frustrations to the second respondent, who shared his desire to design a better payroll software. To that end, they embarked on a personal venture called the 3