Yes the dispute is real, and settled. From my understanding the former CTO requested funds to develop RChain (a new type of blockchain that claims significant innovations and scalability) and his request was denied by the CEO and Investor Board as it implied a larger budget and longer timeline. https://blog.synereo.com/2016/12/03/synereo-update/

From the activity of their respective Slack channels it seems Synereo and RChain will proceed separately.