By Robert B. Milligan, Dawn Mertineit, Daniel P. Hart, and Marcus Mintz
Seyfarth Synopsis: We invite you to watch our highly anticipated webinar, where Seyfarth Shaw LLP’s leading attorneys in non-compete law skillfully guide you through the intricacies of non-compete agreements in the United States, focusing on the latest updates in 2023. This essential webinar provides exclusive insights from our 2023-2024 edition of the 50-State Desktop Reference.
Here are the key takeaways from the webinar:
- Nationwide employers are strongly recommended to review their restrictive covenant agreements. Many states have undergone substantial changes to their laws and substantial liability exists for non-conformance, and federal agencies are increasingly taking the position that overbroad restrictive covenants chill statutorily protected activities.
- Minnesota joins California, Oklahoma, and North Dakota as the 4th state to ban employee non-compete agreements.
- California recently enacted two new non-compete laws. The first specifies that any contract that is void under California law is unenforceable regardless of where and when the employee signed the contract. The likely impact is that companies may use the new law to attempt to cleanse an out of state employee from an otherwise valid non-compete agreement under another state’s law by having the employee move to California to work. The second requires employers to notify current employees, and for former employees who were employed after January 1, 2022, whose contracts include a noncompete clause, or who were required to enter a noncompete agreement, that does not satisfy an exception to this chapter, by February 14, 2024 that the noncompete clause or noncompete agreement is void. Legal challenge of the two new laws is expected.
- Beware of the income threshold increases in several states necessary to enforce restrictive covenant agreements.
- Stay tuned for updates on the enforceability of forfeiture-for-competition and claw-back agreements under Delaware law.
To view a recording of the webinar, click here. You can also view all of our Trade Secrets Webinar recordings by clicking here.