A Yahoo logo is pictured in front of a building in Rolle, 30 km (19 miles) east of Geneva, in this file picture taken December 12, 2012. 
 
 (Reuters) - A high-level female Yahoo Inc executive has been sued in California by a woman who worked under her and is accusing her former boss of sexual harassment and wrongful termination. 
 
 Maria Zhang, a senior director of engineering at Yahoo Mobile, has been sued by Nan Shi, who worked as a principal software engineer in Yahoo from February 2013, according to a complaint filed on July 8 in Santa Clara Superior Court in San Jose, California. 
 
 The complaint alleges that Zhang coerced Shi to have oral and digital sex with her on multiple occasions in Sunnyvale, California, and told her she would have a "bright future" at Yahoo if she had sex with Zhang. 
 
 Shi is seeking monetary as well as punitive damages. The lawsuit also names Yahoo as a defendant. 
 
 "There is absolutely no basis or truth to the allegations against Maria Zhang. Maria is an exemplary Yahoo executive and we intend to fight vigorously to clear her name,” a Yahoo representative said in an email. 
 
 Zhang founded her own mobile company, Alike, which was acquired by Yahoo in 2013. She also worked at Microsoft and Zillow before joining Yahoo, according to her LinkedIn profile. 
 
 In the complaint, Shi accuses Zhang of unfairly downgrading her performance reviews for the second and third quarters of 2013. 
 
 The lawsuit alleges that the company's human resources personnel refused to conduct an investigation when Shi complained about her direct supervisor's advances. 
 
 Instead, according to the complaint, Shi was put on unpaid leave and eventually terminated from her position in the company. 
 
 (Reporting by Devika Krishna Kumar in Bangalore; Editing by Mohammad Zargham) 

 A high-level female Yahoo executive helping to lead the company's mobile-content efforts was named Friday in a state lawsuit filed by a woman working under her who accused the supervisor of sexually harassing her. 
 
 In her complaint, Nan Shi says she was working as a principal software engineer when the supervisor, industry veteran Maria Zhang, forced her to have sex against her will on multiple occasions, promising her "a bright future at Yahoo'' if she acquiesced. After coercing her to have "oral and digital sex,'' Shi says when she finally resisted Zhang's advances, the executive retaliated by giving her a bad performance review and removing her as a project lead. When she reported the abuse to Yahoo, Shi says, the company did nothing to stop it, and then put her on what eventually became an unpaid leave followed by final termination that took effect Friday. 
 
 FILE - This Wednesday, Oct. 17, 2012, file photo, shows a sign in front of Yahoo! headquarters in Sunnyvale, Calif. (Marcio Jose Sanchez/AP Photo) 
 
 The lawsuit names Yahoo as a defendant and lists three causes for damages: sexual-harassment, intentional infliction of emotional distress and wrongful termination. 
 
 According to Shi and her Sunnyvale attorney, Matthew Fisher, Shi had been working for Zhang's mobile-app startup in Seattle and when Yahoo purchased it in 2013, both women came down to work for Yahoo. Shi says Zhang told her to move into a temporary Yahoo housing unit in Sunnyvale. 
 
 "While staying with Plaintiff, Zhang coerced Plaintiff to have oral and digital sex with her on multiple occasions against her will, even after Plaintiff told her she did not want to have sex,'' the complaint alleges. "Zhang told Plaintiff she would have a bright future at Yahoo if she had sex with her. She also stated she could take away everything from her including her job, stocks, and future if she did not do what she wanted.'' 
 
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 The complaint alleges that Zhang, as Shi's manager, forced her "to work grueling hours and compose work emails over the weekend at the apartment, sometimes right after sex.'' 
 
 Zhang did not respond to a request for comment. But a Yahoo spokesperson said "There is absolutely no basis or truth to the allegations against Maria Zhang. Maria is an exemplary Yahoo executive, and we intend to fight vigorously to clear her name." 
 
 According to her LinkedIn profile, "Zhang is a Senior Director of Engineering at Yahoo, where she currently leads the mobile content and mobile SDK team for Yahoo's Mobile and Emerging Products organization. Maria leads the direction and execution of Yahoo Sports, Yahoo Fantasy Sports, Yahoo News Digest and the Yahoo app.'' 
 
 In an emotional interview Friday, Shi broke down as she described being forced to have sex with Zhang. "I was in a deep sleep one morning, sleeping on the sofa because she had taken my bed, when she came in without clothes on, crawled into my blanket, and woke me up, hugging me, kissing my face and neck,'' Shi said. "I woke up and got scared; I was shocked. I said, what are you doing? She said she'd liked me a long time, but I didn't' feel the same toward her. I said come on, we're friends; I love you as a person, but not as a lover.'' 
 
 Shi, who was born in China, said she did not report the assaults to police or to Yahoo because she was worried that publicly going after Zhang could mean the end of her career. But after finally stopping Zhang's advances, she says the supervisor began to "retaliate'' by giving her poor performance evaluations. Finally, this past spring, Shi reported the sexual assaults to Yahoo's human-resources department. 
 
 In 2012, GeekWire named Zhang "Geek of the Week'' for her work on the app she developed. In the Q&A, Zhang said she loves cooking and a "good peach martini." 
 
 Contact Patrick May at 408-920-5689 or follow him at Twitter.com/patmaymerc 

 A high-ranking executive at Yahoo is being sued by an ex-employee on charges of sexual harassment. 
 
 The executive being accused, Maria Zhang, was helping to lead Yahoo’s mobile content efforts, reports the San Jose Mercury News Friday afternoon. 
 
 The complainant, Nan Shi, was working as a software designer at Yahoo, and says she was repeatedly coerced by Zhang into having “oral and digital sex.” Shi says she was terminated after she later refused Zhang’s advances. 
 
 Shi filed her sexual harassment lawsuit Friday, naming Yahoo as a defendant and charging Zhang with sexual-harassment, intentional infliction of emotional distress, and wrongful termination. 
 
 The lawsuit is the latest in a string of such cases in the tech community over the past few months. Tinder chief executive Sean Rad faces a sexual harassment and sex discrimination lawsuit from a former VP of marketing at the company. GitHub CEO Tom Preston-Werner stepped down after claims he sexually harassed an employee. Urban Airship’s Scott Kveton took an “extended leave of absence” after allegations that he raped an ex-girlfriend. 
 
 Shi’s attorney told the Mercury News that Zhang and Shi both came to Yahoo after the software giant bought the Seattle mobile software company where both women worked. 
 
 Shi moved into the Yahoo temporary housing (under orders from Zhang, she says), and Zhang soon moved in with her. It was then that the alleged harassment took place. 
 
 “While staying with Plaintiff, Zhang coerced Plaintiff to have oral and digital sex with her on multiple occasions against her will, even after Plaintiff told her she did not want to have sex,” the complaint alleges. 
 
 “Zhang told Plaintiff she would have a bright future at Yahoo if she had sex with her. She also stated she could take away everything from her including her job, stocks, and future if she did not do what she wanted.” 
 
 The complaint alleges that Zhang (then Shi’s manager at Yahoo), forced her “to work grueling hours and compose work emails over the weekend at the apartment, sometimes right after sex.” 
 
 A Yahoo spokesperson said “There is absolutely no basis or truth to the allegations against Maria Zhang. Maria is an exemplary Yahoo executive and we intend to fight vigorously to clear her name.” 
 
 Read the original article on VentureBeat. Copyright 2014. Follow VentureBeat on Twitter.
– Sexual harassment complaints aren't uncommon in the tech industry, but a new one at Yahoo is making headlines because of an unusual twist: A female executive is accused of coercing a female subordinate into sex. The lawsuit filed by engineer Nan Shi says that her boss, mobile exec Maria Zhang, forced her into sex and then punished her with lousy performance reviews when Shi put a stop to it, reports the San Jose Mercury News. When Shi reported it to Yahoo, the company put her on unpaid leave and eventually fired her, according to the lawsuit. It names Yahoo as a defendant, reports Reuters. “Zhang told Plaintiff she would have a bright future at Yahoo if she had sex with her," says the complaint. "She also stated she could take away everything from her including her job, stocks, and future if she did not do what she wanted.” Both women joined Yahoo last year when it acquired a company founded by Zhang. Shi, a native of China, says Zhang ordered her to move into Yahoo housing in Sunnyvale, Calif., and soon moved in with her. Yahoo is sticking by Zhang and says it will "fight vigorously to clear her name." The suit is the latest in a string of harassment cases in the tech world, notes Business Insider, which has a roundup. (Last year, a tech-conference tweet led to controversy.)