Lihi Pinto-Fryman suing ex husband for millions
Last month, e-commerce startup Syte.ai appointed a new
company CEO: Vered Levy-Ron. At first it seemed like a routine announcement but
behind the new appointment hid a melodramatic saga: the successful company that
had developed an innovative search engine and was founded by a husband-and-wife
team, was involved in a lengthy personal dispute. A few months after the couple
divorced, wife Lihi Pinto-Fryman was fired, and is now suing the company for
NIS 2.4 million ($745,000).
Syte was founded six years ago by Pinto-Fryman and
then-husband Ofer Fryman, who served in a senior position within the company,
as well as Idan Pinto who serves as Chief Financial Officer, and Dr. Helge
Voss, a world expert in machine learning. In 2019, Pinto-Fryman, who was also
Fryman’s then-wife and sister to Idan Pinto, also joined the team.
n the lawsuit filed by Pinto, she raises claims concerning
the “ongoing mistreatment of the defendant over a continuous period of time,
after which she was fired unlawfully without a hearing, due to strange
considerations and ongoing faulty management that harmed her reputation.”
According to the lawsuit, Pinto originally served as Chief
Revenue Officer, and was responsible for company finances, overseeing matters
related to sales and marketing. She claims that over the years of overseeing
the company’s operations, she was involved in raising $71 million in funding,
recruiting 150 employees (while she managed 38), and overseeing $8 million in
sales. According to Pinto, she was the driving force behind the company and
raising capital.
According to Pinto, throughout the end of 2020, cooperation with her brother and husband bore fruit, and there was consensus between both parties, citing that in December 2020 the company’s board decided to raise her salary to NIS 80,000 ($24,800). She claims that in discussions with Ronen Nir, a representative of Viola Ventures on Syte’s board, she was offered the position of active CEO. She refused the offer due to her relationship with her husband, who managed the company.
However, she claims that all changed in February 2021, after she sent an email to her husband and brother with a hidden copy to Nir. In the email, she warned of the company’s failures which allegedly interfered with its operations and went unaddressed. In response, Nir answered her, revealing that he was also sent the email. From that moment on, she says she was excluded from all company activity. In April, after being excluded from all management meetings, she sent a detailed account of her alleged complaints to the board, which she claims were sneered at, and shortly afterward the board decided to terminate her employment.
On April 21, 2021, she claimed that she
received a phone call from board member Zvi Limon, Partner at Magma Venture
Partners, who invested in the company, and he told her: “The board has decided
to fire you.” Calcalist has learned that the board made two decisions that day:
to look for a new CEO to replace Ofer, and to invite Lihi to a hearing with
Limon.
Five days later she received notification of her dismissal
in the form of a settlement, which she claims, “was conducted without hearing
her claims, and in a manner that put extensive stress on the plaintiff. As part
of the proposed arrangement, Pinto was asked to relinquish her rights, and not
sue any member of the company, while one-sidedly changing her social rights.”
In the letter the company sent her, it alleged that despite
being told that the company was not meeting its quarterly sales targets, Pinto
and her husband chose to instead embark on a slander-filled campaign of
professional and personal mudslinging. The letter also noted that Pinto didn’t
arrive at its offices for a month, did not converse with other executives, and
that any attempt to discuss such matters with her “ended with slamming Ofer and
completely blaming him for the company’s professional shortcomings.”
Pinto claims that after she rejected the settlement, she was
invited to a hearing before being fired, although “it was clear that it was
done with a lack of faith, and neither with an open heart nor mind.”
According to Pinto, the company improperly used her
relationship between her and her husband to claim that she was involved in her
own matters and not company ones. She quoted the company: “You notified the
company in utter secrecy of your sudden divorce from your spouse, and it is up
to the company to decide which one of you will continue with the company and
which will be fired.” She believes that those quotes back up her claims of the
real reason behind her dismissal, and claims that she never demanded anyone be
fired. She also believes her ex-husband was responsible for trampling her
reputation.
Pinto refused to respond to the article since legal
proceedings are currently ongoing.
Syte said in response: “The lawsuit’s claims are baseless
and the allegations contradict the facts. The company rejects these
allegations, and any that arise from the article. Syte is managing the entire
proceedings in a fair and sensitive manner with close legal assistance. The
company’s management will continue to manage the proceedings in the legal
sphere and not in the media, and with the company’s best interests and
continued growth and development in mind.”
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