Trade Secrets

This week on Capitol Hill, the Democrat-controlled House of Representatives has planned a number of hearings on climate change and antitrust matters, especially where the T-Mobile/Sprint merger is concerned. In the Senate, cybersecurity takes center stage at the Senate Homeland Security and Energy Committees. Elsewhere in Washington, D.C., the Brookings ... Read More

This week on Capitol Hill, the Democrat-controlled House of Representatives has planned a number of hearings on climate change and antitrust matters, especially where the T-Mobile/Sprint merger is concerned. In the Senate, cybersecurity takes center stage at the Senate Homeland Security and Energy Committees. Elsewhere in Washington, D.C., the Brookings ... Read More

Last November, we discussed the potential impact of a recent California appellate court decision, AMN Healthcare, Inc. v. Aya Healthcare Services, Inc., 28 Cal. App. 5th 923 (2018), which called into question long-standing California precedent enforcing certain employee non-solicitation provisions.  However, we noted it was too soon to forecast the ... Read More

To the casual observer, the Supreme Court’s January 23 decision in Helsinn v. Teva may seem like no big deal. In just a few pages of text, the Court informs us that Congress did not change the established meaning of “on sale” prior art when it rewrote Section 102 of ... Read More

This week on Capitol Hill, committee hearings in the U.S. Senate will focus on innovations related to financial systems, the race to 5G network connectivity and advances in energy-related technologies. In the U.S. House of Representatives, net neutrality makes its return as a hotly-debated topic, while the House Science Committee ... Read More

Intellectual property (IP) promotes innovation. The limited right to exclude others from copying patented inventions, copyrighted original works of authorship, and trademarked brands and logos encourages innovators to invest their time and money. IP appeals to our sense of fairness by discouraging or preventing counterfeiting, passing off, and other harmful ... Read More

Employers in many industries use non-compete agreements as a key tool to protect trade secrets.  According to U.S. Treasury reports, non-compete agreements impact approximately 30 million – nearly one in five – U.S. workers, including roughly one in six workers without a college degree. Some employers have imposed non-compete agreements ... Read More

This week in Other Barks & Bites: Huawei is in hot water with both the U.S. and UK governments, while Qualcomm has just completed a new patent licensing deal with Huawei; IBM tops a new global list for most artificial intelligence-related patent applications filed; Apple files another appeal of a ... Read More

“Bad Artists Copy. Good Artists Steal” – Pablo Picasso In the small world of exclusive and upscale art sales, competing galleries inevitably form and maintain relationships with one another.  This is the case for Lévy Gorvey gallery partner Dominque Lévy, and Lehmann Maupin Group co-founder Rachel Lehmann, who have known ... Read More

It’s a challenge to resolve business disputes when emotions run high, which includes almost all trade secret cases. So, I was especially pleased when, in a hard-fought litigation where I had been appointed as a “referee” to resolve discovery disputes, both lawyers eventually reached out to tell me how much ... Read More

With the holidays behind us and our calendars flipped over to 2019, we’re taking a look back at some key trade secrets developments of the past year.  Here are some of the big cases and legislative developments from 2018. Massachusetts Adopted the UTSA Starting with legislation, Massachusetts made headlines in ... Read More

With the holidays behind us and our calendars flipped over to 2019, we’re taking a look back at some key trade secrets developments of the past year.  Here are some of the big cases and legislative developments from 2018. Massachusetts Adopted the UTSA Starting with legislation, Massachusetts made headlines in ... Read More

When Congress enacted the DTSA on May 11, 2016, it left open the issue of whether the DTSA would apply to misappropriation that occurred prior.  As we previously reported, many federal district courts have since found that it does apply if there were continuing acts of misappropriation after enactment of ... Read More

When Congress enacted the DTSA on May 11, 2016, it left open the issue of whether the DTSA would apply to misappropriation that occurred prior.  As we previously reported, many federal district courts have since found that it does apply if there were continuing acts of misappropriation after enactment of ... Read More

Amid a growing body of unsettled law regarding the patentability of software and business methods patents, companies are increasingly choosing to maintain their valuable innovations as trade secrets rather than risk a rejected patent application. There are pros and cons to both forms of intellectual property protection. However, the decision ... Read More

Amid a growing body of unsettled law regarding the patentability of software and business methods patents, companies are increasingly choosing to maintain their valuable innovations as trade secrets rather than risk a rejected patent application. There are pros and cons to both forms of intellectual property protection. However, the decision ... Read More

A $700 million jury award for trade secrets misappropriation and fraud is the product of a collusive scheme to deceive the jury, claims title insurance and valuations provider Amrock, formerly known as Title Source, in its recent bid for a new trial. The blockbuster award to technology start-up HouseCanary arose ... Read More

A $700 million jury award for trade secrets misappropriation and fraud is the product of a collusive scheme to deceive the jury, claims title insurance and valuations provider Amrock, formerly known as Title Source, in its recent bid for a new trial. The blockbuster award to technology start-up HouseCanary arose ... Read More

Although every case had its own special facts reflecting unique personalities, technologies and business models, one necessary element was present in every single case. Somebody had done something stupid. And they still do. Sometimes it’s about what people do when getting ready to leave their job and go into competition. ... Read More

It’s football season, so of course we should be talking about beer. Specifically, beer secrets. For fourteen years James Clark had an enviable job at Anheuser-Busch, where he had access to the brewer’s confidential recipes. For unexplained reasons he resigned. Instead of joining a competitor, he went to see a ... Read More

As we reported in August, Massachusetts became the penultimate state to enact the Uniform Trade Secrets Act (UTSA), leaving New York as the sole remaining holdout. Massachusetts’ new law, which took effect October 1, 2018, significantly expanded the state’s existing trade secrets law by broadening protections for trade secret owners ... Read More

As we reported in August, Massachusetts became the penultimate state to enact the Uniform Trade Secrets Act (UTSA), leaving New York as the sole remaining holdout. Massachusetts’ new law, which took effect October 1, 2018, significantly expanded the state’s existing trade secrets law by broadening protections for trade secret owners ... Read More

Andy Bitter, a former sports journalist covering the travails and triumphs of the Virginia Tech football team, was sued last month by his former employer, a local newspaper, for trade secret theft. According to the plaintiff Roanoke Times he was obligated by the company’s employee handbook to turn over all ... Read More

On October 25, the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts denied motions for injunctive relief in a case involving trade secrets allegedly stolen by a departing consultant using his personal computer to sync with the company’s Dropbox.  This case established (1) Massachusetts’ newly enacted Uniform Trade Secrets Act ... Read More

On October 25, the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts denied motions for injunctive relief in a case involving trade secrets allegedly stolen by a departing consultant using his personal computer to sync with the company’s Dropbox.  This case established (1) Massachusetts’ newly enacted Uniform Trade Secrets Act ... Read More

Trade secret holders must take reasonable precautions to maintain the secrecy of their secrets, such as keeping such information on a “need-to-know” basis. Companies should have clear IP, confidentiality, and employment agreements describing which types of information are considered trade secrets. These agreements should also describe an employee’s responsibility for ... Read More

Our readers have seen enough of our blog posts to be familiar with the classic ex-employee trade secrets theft scenario:  employee downloads confidential files to his personal computer; employee attempts to cover his tracks with deletions of those files; employee resigns from the company to work for a competitor. When ... Read More

Our readers have seen enough of our blog posts to be familiar with the classic ex-employee trade secrets theft scenario:  employee downloads confidential files to his personal computer; employee attempts to cover his tracks with deletions of those files; employee resigns from the company to work for a competitor. When ... Read More

When National Fish and Seafood’s (NFS) head of research left for a new opportunity at Tampa Bay Fisheries, she may not have taken just her talents to the competition.  According to NFS’ lawsuit, the former employee transferred thousands of files containing confidential and proprietary information prior to her departure from ... Read More

When National Fish and Seafood’s (NFS) head of research left for a new opportunity at Tampa Bay Fisheries, she may not have taken just her talents to the competition.  According to NFS’ lawsuit, the former employee transferred thousands of files containing confidential and proprietary information prior to her departure from ... Read More