Cross-posted from Workplace Law & Strategy blog.
When an ex-employee goes to a competitor or starts poaching clients or staff, employers often look to a restraint of trade clause to protect key business assets such as client relationships or company confidential information.
Often a quick decision needs to be made: apply to the Court to stop the ex-employee, or wait and sue for breach of contract damages at some later time. Wrapped up in this decision is the important issue of prospects of success—an employer will want to know there is a good chance of a successful outcome. Continue Reading Will We Win? The Odds of Success in Restraint of Trade Cases
Seyfarth Trade Secrets Attorneys are participating in The Sedona Conference Working Group 12 Annual Meeting in Charlotte, North Carolina, November 4–5, 2019.
Over the course of the past several years, several states have banned or severely restricted the ability of businesses to bind low-wage workers to post-employment restrictive covenants. Since 2007, Oregon has banned non-compete agreements for all employees except those who are exempt (as defined by the state’s overtime payment statute) and whose annualized compensation at the time of termination exceeds the median income of a four-person family, as determined by the United States Census Bureau for the most recent year available at the time of the employee’s termination ($56,119 per year based on most currently-available data). In 2016, Illinois passed a statute banning non-compete agreements with low-wage workers (defined in Illinois to be non-governmental workers making less than the greater of the prevailing federal, state, or local minimum wage or $13 per hour). In 2018, contained within a wider-ranging non-compete bill, Massachusetts also banned employers from entering into non-compete agreements with non-exempt employees, as those employees classification is defined by the Fair Labor Standards Act (“FLSA”), as well as employees under age 18, paid or unpaid student interns, or other short-term student employees who are enrolled in school.
Seyfarth is pleased to be a Global Sponsor at ITechLaw’s 2019 European Conference in Dublin, October 30–November 1.
Courts have long lamented that “computing damages in a trade secret case is not cut and dry,” Am. Sales Corp. v. Adventure Travel, Inc., 862 F. Supp. 1476, 1479 (E.D. Va. 1994), meaning that “every [trade secret] case requires a flexible and imaginative approach to the problem of damages,” Univ. Computing Co. v. Lykes-Youngstown Corp., 504 F.2d 518, 538 (5th Cir. 1974).
Attorney General Becerra’s office posted the 
Significant developments in state and federal courts throughout the country, as well as in Congress and State legislatures, have changed the landscape of trade secret protection and restrictive covenant enforcement. Understanding the impact of these changes, and the tools now available to employers for trade secret protection and restrictive covenant enforcement, will help your company safeguard its most valuable assets and maintain its advantage over competitors.
In our May blog post, we took issue with the broadcast statement that ‘consumer privacy law was sweeping the country and that other states were jumping on the California Consumer Privacy Law (CCPA) bandwagon to enact their own state law.’ The problem as we saw it, was that the truth behind these sensationalistic statements was a bit more nuanced than people were led to believe. Most states, we found, that introduced consumer privacy legislation simply did not follow through, either by outright killing the legislation (MS) or by taking a step back with a wait and see approach (see TX). Nevada, by contrast, did neither. Instead, its legislature enacted its own consumer privacy solution, through SB 220, or as we call it, ‘the limited privacy amendment.’ We’ve opted to discuss Nevada’s approach here primarily because of its more restrictive application online and because its October 1, 2019, operational date is a full three months before the CCPA becomes operational.
Seyfarth Partner J. Scott Humphrey is presenting the “Trade Secrets Theft: A Holistic Approach to Protect Your Company” webinar for The Knowledge Group on Wednesday, October 2 from 3:00 p.m. to 4:30 p.m. Eastern Time.