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Strapped startup declines acquihire, Apple poaches key engineers; NP, says court [pdf]

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Re: Strapped startup declines acquihire, Apple poaches key engineers; NP, says court [pdf]

#341

Post by raverbashing »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #330
raverbashing wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Personal bankruptcy does not apply to corporate contexts. And it is much rarer than in the US

> Personal bankruptcy does not apply to corporate contexts Most entrepreneurs have leveraged their personal finances at some point. I personally remember running payroll off a personal credit card in a particularly tough quarter. That route is prohibitively risky in most European countries. > it is much rarer than in the US That is the point. There is reduced risk taking in Europe. Many entrepreneurs’ successes are p…

> That route is prohibitively risky in most European countries.

I'd say this is risky everywhere and regardless of the fact that personal bankruptcy is a thing in the US. Heck, running big debts on credit cards is a pretty unique US thing, because usually the limits are either little and/or the interest rate is prohibitive.

I agree the risk taking is smaller in Europe, but if you need a loan go talk to your bank, putting a debt in a credit card is a stupid idea period even in the US.

Re: Strapped startup declines acquihire, Apple poaches key engineers; NP, says court [pdf]

#342

Post by jsjohnst »

dctoedt wrote: post #316
csallen wrote: post #306

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In my limited experience with lawyers, they always advise conservatism. That's not to say they're always wrong. But they don't have much incentive to say, "Go for it!" Even if you're 95% chance likely to have things work out okay, what would the lawyer get in that situation? Nothing. And in the 5% of cases they'd be excoriated for giving their client bad advice.

> Even if you're 95% chance likely to have things work out okay, what would the lawyer get in that situation? Nothing. And in the 5% of cases they'd be excoriated for giving their client bad advice. Spot on. EDIT: On further thought, there's a wrinkle, which is that NOT being super-conservative can be good marketing for a lawyer. In a 95% confidence situation, consider the lawyer who tells the client, "here are the p…

IANAL, but from my understanding, it’s a bit more complicated than that. If a lawyer tells you something is “probably ok”, but doesn’t cage that “probable” in enough legalese, then they can potentially be held liable in court. This is why you’ll rarely see a good attorney saying things like you suggested.

Ultimately though, there is an important thing that GP’s friend missed out on. Lawyers do not tell you what to do, rather instead they advise you of risk on what your options are. It’s your responsibility to decide how much risk you are willing to bear.

Re: Strapped startup declines acquihire, Apple poaches key engineers; NP, says court [pdf]

#343

Post by reader_mode »

mattmanser wrote: post #322
reader_mode wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

UK is trying hard not to be a part of Europe it seems :) Anyway I've seen similar laws in several countries in EU, but I talked to a lawyer friend and he said he looked into it (briefly) and couldn't find examples of it being enforced through court in my country (Croatia). As for termination - probation periods exist for sure but passed that it's really hard to get rid of people, the two year thing exists if you give…

This story sounds like there's much more to it than meets the eye. Again, UK, but you can't just move an employee around willy-nilly. This could be construed as constructive dismissal. You might know the employee can't relocate, and are trying to force them to quit so you don't have to pay redundancy pay.

But this wasn't about relocation - there are regular bus lines between her previous place of work and new one (it was basically an office outside of city and she then got moved to office inside of city, distance is less than 15KM by car) - it's just that she was hired to work in place A and she wasn't willing to travel, also she's not exactly an agreeable personality. Court ruled that she got hired in position A and that was in her work description and they couldn't change that without good cause (and they were doing office rotations I don't know exactly why)

Re: Strapped startup declines acquihire, Apple poaches key engineers; NP, says court [pdf]

#344

Post by KingOfCoders »

Qiu_Zhanxuan wrote: post #296
KingOfCoders wrote: post #270

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Southern France has wonderful weather and the Mediterranean Sea. The EU should start a special economic zone for startups there (a split of later taxes going into the EU budget).

Currently in Paris as everything is centralized there but indeed, if the opportunity ever presented itself I would move to Nice in a heartbeat, the rest of the bigger cities (Marseilles, Montpellier) suffer a bad reputation though...

Still remember sleeping some nights on the beach in Nice, awesome days.

Re: Strapped startup declines acquihire, Apple poaches key engineers; NP, says court [pdf]

#345

Post by ghaff »

watwut wrote: post #324
travisjungroth wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your comment reminds me of this tweet: https://mobile.twitter.com/zackkanter/status/130493861651941... The cognitive dissonance humans are capable of is amazing. To actually say “We would never allow that in our town.” in the pejorative while flying back from a trip specifically meant to learn how to be like another town . If you’re not going to act on an author’s central point, don’t try to do any of the other parts…

> The cognitive dissonance humans are capable of is amazing. To actually say “We would never allow that in our town.” in the pejorative while flying back from a trip specifically meant to learn how to be like another town. That is not cognitive dissonance. They flew in trying to learn how other town achieved goal. Once they know, they are still allowed to dislike the method or part of it. But also, I don't the the no…

CA law around non-competes is great and all but:

1. It's not like CA doesn't have NDAs, trade secrets, anti-poaching, IP restrictions, etc.

2. It's not like everyplace else in the world (or even in the US) you're an indentured servant who is never allowed to move to another company (occasional man bites dog headlines about a fast food worker notwithstanding)

Re: Strapped startup declines acquihire, Apple poaches key engineers; NP, says court [pdf]

#346

Post by fennecfoxen »

cortesoft wrote: post #172
ChuckMcM wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly correct. I tried to explain this to a public official from an east cost town who was flying back from the Bay Area trying to "learn the secrets" of creating an innovation hub. When I explained this situation (non-competes are illegal, stuff you do at home is yours) to him he literally said "That's crazy! Why would anyone hire anyone if they knew they could walk out the door to a competitor, or even to start a…

> "That's crazy! Why would anyone hire anyone if they knew they could walk out the door to a competitor, or even to start a competitor? He needs to flip that around... why would any employee agree to be hired when they can't leave, and can't work on things in their own time? He doesn't understand that in this industry, it is the workers who are in short supply, not the capital. The best companies go to california and…

"Workers" are abundant. It's the human capital associated with the workers that's expensive. Engineers moving to California should be considered like other capital flows: there are unlikely to be major flows into places where their flexibility is unduly impaired by regulations structured to favor existing, powerful incumbent interests (in this case, the noncompetes).

Re: Strapped startup declines acquihire, Apple poaches key engineers; NP, says court [pdf]

#347

Post by fnord123 »

Animats wrote: post #2

"That evidence does suggest the engineers drew on knowledge and skills they gained from Hooked to develop a product for their new employer––but California’s policy favoring free mobility for employees specifically allows that. (See Whyte v. Schlage Lock Co. (2002) 101Cal.App.4th 1443, 1464 [rejecting the “inevitable disclosure” doctrine, under which a claim for trade secret misappropriation is stated if an employee’s…

>Which is why Silicon Valley is in California, and why attempts to create a startup culture elsewhere have mostly failed.

FWIW, non competes aren't enforceable in much of Europe unless the employer pays the person who left. This is known as Garden Leave in the UK.

Re: Strapped startup declines acquihire, Apple poaches key engineers; NP, says court [pdf]

#348

Post by piokoch »

ChuckMcM wrote: post #147
Animats wrote: post #2

"That evidence does suggest the engineers drew on knowledge and skills they gained from Hooked to develop a product for their new employer––but California’s policy favoring free mobility for employees specifically allows that. (See Whyte v. Schlage Lock Co. (2002) 101Cal.App.4th 1443, 1464 [rejecting the “inevitable disclosure” doctrine, under which a claim for trade secret misappropriation is stated if an employee’s…

Exactly correct. I tried to explain this to a public official from an east cost town who was flying back from the Bay Area trying to "learn the secrets" of creating an innovation hub. When I explained this situation (non-competes are illegal, stuff you do at home is yours) to him he literally said "That's crazy! Why would anyone hire anyone if they knew they could walk out the door to a competitor, or even to start a…

Are you sure that forbidding non-competence clause was really a big factor in Silicon Valley success. This sounds a little bit to simple. I was reading that it was all about initial founding from the military, access to large capital investments, proximity of good universities and existence of whole ecosystem targeted into making creation of startups easier.

In Poland non-competence exists too, but in theory - it can last one year at most and employer has to pay 25% of the last employee income (missing a single payment invalidates clause), so, giving the trouble of paying, handling accounting, etc. companies rarely use that (oddly enough, if this clause is used, it is used for sales people) and I don't see another SV build anywhere here.

Re: Strapped startup declines acquihire, Apple poaches key engineers; NP, says court [pdf]

#349

Post by hef19898 »

CPLX wrote: post #293
hef19898 wrote: post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

IMHO there is more to SV than just that. Case in point, in Germany non-competes are basically non-enforceable, patentble inventions have to be offered to your current employer so. But only if they are directly linked to your current job, not which equipment yu are using. And if it is not directly linked to your current job, it's all yours. And still, we don't have anything near to SV over here.

> And still, we don't have anything near to SV over here. You don’t? I mean, Germany is a technology powerhouse, with arguably the best engineering sector on the planet. It just has a different set of technology products than Silicon Valley. If I were a public policy leader interested in building a more durable, equitable economy for my citizens I would gladly choose the German model.

True that. We seem to struggle so to get all that power on the road for quite some time:

- TVs: Went first to Japan and then Korea then China

- Cameras: Went to japan

- MP3: Went to the US

- Cars: We totally missed the trend to EVs

- Big engineering projects: Pretty bad track record so far, e.g. the Berlin airport. German companies are still supplying components and sub-systems to these projects worldwide, but they are rarely the general contractor anymore.

It would be nice to see that being changed, but everything that is new tech just seems to be an unsurmountable obstacle for a lot of German companies and institutions.

Re: Strapped startup declines acquihire, Apple poaches key engineers; NP, says court [pdf]

#350

Post by fnord123 »

travisjungroth wrote: post #169
ChuckMcM wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly correct. I tried to explain this to a public official from an east cost town who was flying back from the Bay Area trying to "learn the secrets" of creating an innovation hub. When I explained this situation (non-competes are illegal, stuff you do at home is yours) to him he literally said "That's crazy! Why would anyone hire anyone if they knew they could walk out the door to a competitor, or even to start a…

Your comment reminds me of this tweet: https://mobile.twitter.com/zackkanter/status/130493861651941... The cognitive dissonance humans are capable of is amazing. To actually say “We would never allow that in our town.” in the pejorative while flying back from a trip specifically meant to learn how to be like another town . If you’re not going to act on an author’s central point, don’t try to do any of the other parts…

Maybe it depends on what you mean by "recipe for success of Silicon Valley" but I doubt weather has primary influence on the recipe. Sweden, South Korea, and Switzerland are considered the top 3 "innovative economies"[1] in the world and aren't particularly notable for their weather.

[1] usually this means a mix of #patents filed, number of phds/100,000 and r&d expenditure/gdp. Not sure how you would rather measure the success of silicon valley to set it apart.

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