Total Articles: 2
Failure to Update Non-compete Agreements after Purchase of Company Foils Enforcement
The federal appeals court in Boston has underscored the importance of carefully examining and understanding restrictive covenants, such as non-competes and non-solicitation agreements, that may be acquired in a business purchase. The Court found a one-year non-compete clause in a restrictive covenant agreement expired and unenforceable against former employees when it was sought to be invoked more than one year following the sale of the company that had entered into the agreements with them. OfficeMax, Inc. v. Levesque, 2011 U.S. App. LEXIS 18816 (1st Cir. Sept. 12, 2011). Accordingly, the Court refused to enforce the District Court’s preliminary injunction restricting the former employees from competing with OfficeMax, an office supplies company that bought the assets of Boise Cascade Office Products Corp. (BCOP), another office supply company.
New Massachusetts Non-Compete Legislation Introduced
A few weeks ago, we outlined the Top 5 Non-Compete Issues to Watch For In 2011. Among our top five, we noted that non-compete legislation stalled in the Massachusetts Legislature in 2010, and we forecasted that new and modified legislation would be introduced in 2011. Sure enough, a new bill was recently introduced. It contains numerous changes from the prior legislation, and it addresses issues ranging from consideration to garden leave to inevitable disclosure. An excellent summary of the proposed legislation along with a description of the changes from last year's bill is available on Russell Beck's blog at FairCompetitionLaw.com.
