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On Friday, the Department of Justice filed a lawsuit against eBay accusing the company of entering a non-compete pact with software maker Intuit. Under the terms of the alleged secret deal, both companies agreed to refrain from recruiting or hiring each other’s employees. According to the DOJ, both companies aggressively policed their respective workforces to … Continue reading
The Zynga saga continues. In October, Zynga – the company that makes popular Facebook games like FarmVille – filed a lawsuit against a former employee, Allan Patmore. In short, Zynga alleges that Patmore left the company, took a ton of confidential information and trade secrets with him then went to work for a competitor Kixeye. … Continue reading
A recent non-compete case out of Missouri raises a number of interesting considerations, including some related to choice of law and conflicts of law. The case is TLC Vision (USA) Corp. v. Freeman, 2012 WL 5398671 (E.D. Mo. Nov. 2, 2012). TLC is basically in the business of running centers that provide vision correction services. … Continue reading
In the realm of non-compete and trade secret litigation, there are certain truisms that have stood the test of time. Among the most basic: Do not take company files with you. This is a classic blunder. You know, like getting involved in a land war in Asia. It is a bad idea. When you take … Continue reading
Yesterday evening, at a cigar bar in Fort Lauderdale (shout out to the Florida Cigar Company), I had a discussion with a few gentlemen that touched upon the issues of confidential information, non-compete agreements and computer forensics. One of these gentlemen was in the process of separating from his current employer and starting his own … Continue reading
As an attorney who defends employees in non-compete cases, I am generally critical of how such agreements are used. For one thing, it seems that everybody has a non-compete agreement these days (maids, bartenders, news anchors), even when the facts suggest that such an agreement is unenforceable. And every plaintiff in every non-compete case runs … Continue reading
Interesting non-compete news out of Weymouth, Massachusetts (a small city about twenty miles south of Boston). Back in September 2009, a Boston-area dentist Gerald Maher sold his practice to a newly formed company called Dental Wellness. As part of the transaction, Maher agreed (1) to refrain from practicing dentistry within a 15-mile radius of Dental … Continue reading
In today’s America, non-compete agreements have become ubiquitous. Everybody has one. The wine salesman. The disc jockey. The advertising executive. Even the maid. One of the most obscene examples of the widespread use (and abuse) of non-compete agreements is that of non-competes in the healthcare industry. Many doctors are either driven out of town – … Continue reading
The widespread use of non-compete agreements – along with the concept of captive clients and captive labor – continues to produce the most absurd scenarios. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you MaidPro. MaidPro is a cleaning service. Recently, MaidPro was involved in a spat with a customer in Washington D.C. The customer had used a … Continue reading
In Florida, non-compete agreements are governed by Florida Statute 542.335. The statute indicates that non-compete agreements can only be used to protect legitimate business interests. Although the Statute does not claim to be exhaustive, it does spell out a number of such interests. These interests include relationships with customers. In characteristic fashion, many companies suing … Continue reading
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