We invite you to review our newly-posted November 2018 California Employment Law Notes, a comprehensive review of the latest and most significant developments in California employment law. The highlights include:

AMN Healthcare, Inc. v. Aya Healthcare Servs., Inc., 2018 WL 5669154 (Cal. Ct. App. 2018)

AMN and Aya are competitors in the business of providing travel nurses on a temporary basis to medical care facilities throughout the country. As a condition of employment with AMN, four of its “travel nurse recruiters” had signed a Confidentiality and Non-Disclosure Agreement (“CNDA”), which among other things prohibited

World Fin. Group, Inc. v. HBW Ins. & Fin. Services, Inc., 172 Cal. App. 4th 1561 (2009)

WFG filed a complaint against its direct competitor, HBW, and six of its agents for alleged breach of contract, misappropriation of trade secrets, conversion, unfair competition, interference with prospective economic advantage and unjust enrichment. In response, HBW filed a motion to dismiss the complaint as a SLAPP

Alliant Ins. Services, Inc. v. Gaddy, 159 Cal. App. 4th 1292 (2008)

Alliant Insurance Services purchased a competing insurance brokerage company from G. Scott Gaddy for $4.1 million and then employed him under a senior management agreement. Both the purchase and employment agreements contained covenants whereby Gaddy agreed not to compete with Alliant or to solicit Alliant’s or Gaddy’s clients for three years following

ReadyLink Healthcare v. Cotton, 126 Cal. App. 4th 1006 (2005)

ReadyLink obtained an injunction against Jerome Cotton, a former employee, prohibiting Cotton from soliciting ReadyLink employees and customers and from using or disclosing ReadyLink’s trade secrets and confidential information. ReadyLink fired Cotton for stealing ReadyLink records containing proprietary and confidential information. During a search of his residence and storage locker (to which Cotton consented),

DVD Copy Control Ass’n, Inc. v. Bunner, 31 Cal. 4th 864, 75 P.3d 1 (Cal. 2003)

Jon Johansen, a Norwegian resident, reverse engineered the Content Scrambling System (CSS), computer software used to encrypt the contents of Digital Versatile Discs (DVDs), and wrote a program called DeCSS that decrypts motion pictures stored on DVDs, thus enabling users to freely copy and distribute the movies. Johansen

Cadence Design Sys. v. Avant! Corp., 29 Cal. 4th 215 (2002)

In this case, the California Supreme Court answered the following question of law certified to it from the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit: Under the California Uniform Trade Secrets Act (UTSA), when does a claim for trade secret infringement arise: only once, when the initial misappropriation occurs, or with