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

Post by DetroitThrow » Mon, Oct 05, 2020, 12:04 AM UTC

donor20 wrote: post #50

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…

Labor mobility is really low in Europe. In france you can be tied up in litigation (tribunel through appeals) for 10 years easily on an employment termination (my info is from 2016 time frame so may be dated). There is no such thing as at-will employment. Also, noncompete's are weird. If someone is receiving full pay on gardening leave they can work for someone else. If you instead have them work till end of notice p…

Post by jojobas » Mon, Oct 05, 2020, 12:06 AM UTC

djur wrote: post #19

> The CEO settled on a new plan: Hooked would “sell” three engineers to Apple... Hooked’s CEO pitched the idea to Apple, providing background information about the engineers and sending their resumes. Apple responded that it might consider paying a “finder’s fee”... Even if was inclined to take Hooked's side on this, it was a huge mistake to send information about those engineers without an existing agreement. (Also:…

Post by mthoms » Mon, Oct 05, 2020, 12:11 AM UTC

runT1ME wrote: post #73

mthoms wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It was Apple that ultimately backed out of the "acqui-hire", not the target company's CEO. Edit: Nope, I was wrong here. I think the rest of this comment is still relevant though. And for all we know, it may have been her investors that encouraged (demanded?) her to go the route of "selling" the employees[0]. It appears the company would be winding down and they stood to benefit by recouping some of their investment.…

Not what it says, direct quote: "Hooked’s CEO declined, saying there were other acquisition possibilities she would like to see play out."

Post by baby » Mon, Oct 05, 2020, 12:12 AM UTC

batmaniam wrote: post #18

tallgiraffe wrote: post #4

Sounds like a few engineers found out that Apple was looking into their company and knowing Apple was interested they took a new gig, meanwhile the CEO got upset and decided to fire the last remaining defecting engineer, who out of goodness of heart actually declined Apple, but gratefully took the offer once he got fired. Although it probably hurts to have your team poached, it sounds like potentially it wasn't a gre…

We should rid of the term 'poaching'. There's no such thing. We're not animals, we are free to accept a better offer it comes along. The CEO should have counter offered with something more substantial, but he couldn't so the engineers went to greener pastures.

Post by throwqrm » Mon, Oct 05, 2020, 12:24 AM UTC

baby wrote: post #78

batmaniam wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We should rid of the term 'poaching'. There's no such thing. We're not animals, we are free to accept a better offer it comes along. The CEO should have counter offered with something more substantial, but he couldn't so the engineers went to greener pastures.

At the same time how can smaller companies compete with large companies if they can’t match salaries?