Brisbane ‘body sculpting’ company accused of spreading lie that rival hired pretty women to seduce MDs

A Bay Area medical device company is accused in a new lawsuit of spreading lies about a rival, including that it “hired good-looking female sales representatives to sleep with doctors in order to sell products.”

Cutera, a Brisbane firm making lasers and other equipment for “body sculpting,” skin treatments, and removal of lesions, hair and tattoos, falsely told influential doctors that its competitor Lutronic Aesthetics was engaging in several unsavory practices, Lutronic claimed in the lawsuit filed last week.

Massachusetts-based Lutronic alleged the lies followed a trade secrets dispute that began in 2020, over Cutera employees resigning and going to work for Lutronic.

“The working environment at Cutera is permeated with misogyny, vulgarity and, among some employees, illegal drug use,” the lawsuit filed Thursday in San Mateo County Superior Court claimed. “After the departure of the employees … Cutera’s workplace grew even more toxic by also becoming permeated by an obsessive desire to exact revenge against and destroy Lutronic Aesthetics and the ex-employees who left to join Lutronic Aesthetics.”

Cutera said it planned to “vigorously defend itself” against the lawsuit’s claims.

Lutronic in its lawsuit claimed that Cutera, in addition to telling “key opinion leader” doctors that Lutronic was deploying attractive sales representatives to seduce physicians, also told those doctors Lutronic was handing out free equipment in return for endorsements. That lie was intended to undermine the credibility of doctors who endorsed Lutronic’s products, and make it harder for Lutronic to sell to other doctors who would not want to pay asking price for equipment they thought their competitors were getting free, the lawsuit alleged.

Cutera, whose marketing materials include references to “Hollywood’s hottest bodies” and “fast, reliable” fat reduction, also falsely told doctors that Lutronic had no U.S. service technicians, that it was a failing business, that it manufactured its products illegally, and that some sales and marketing employees who left Cutera had committed crimes that would land them in prison, the lawsuit claimed.