Trade Secrets

Sullivan & Cromwell’s Trade Secrets Group provides clients with a deep bench of experienced lawyers from practice groups across the Firm. In trade secrets matters, lawyers from our internationally recognized Intellectual Property & Technology Litigation, Criminal Defense & Investigations, Employment Law, Intellectual Property & Technology Transactions and Executive Compensation groups collaborate to provide tailored guidance directly responsive to client needs.

Our Trade Secrets Group covers the entire spectrum of trade secret issues from pre-litigation advisory work to litigation in a plethora of jurisdictions on behalf of both plaintiffs and defendants all the way through appeal to advice on trade secret licenses or other commercial agreements involving trade secrets and noncompete provisions. S&C also prides itself on taking a commercial approach to matters to provide practical advice to our clients. We understand the nuances frequently involved in business and trade secret matters and craft creative solutions to meet our clients’ needs. We approach trade secrets work as trusted advisors to our clients, providing guidance on risk management and how to strengthen existing protections, implement new protections and litigate (both offensive and defensive) when those protections are disputed.

Our lawyers regularly advise clients on:

Pre-litigation disputes, including advising clients on proactive steps to protect their trade secrets and responding to cease-and-desist letters alleging actual or prospective trade secret misappropriation
Offensive and defensive litigation alleging the misappropriation of trade secrets, including when competitors hire each other’s employees who possess sensitive information. S&C excels at representing clients in complex litigation involving employer/employee dynamics, employment and consulting agreements, and alleged misappropriation of trade secrets and/or violations of restrictive covenants. We also leverage our leading investigations lawyers to quickly and discreetly investigate the allegations underlying such litigation.
Transactions involving trade secrets and other complex technology and intellectual property issues, including in mergers and acquisitions, divestitures, licenses, joint ventures, and collaborations. We counsel clients across a wide range of industries where trade secrets are important to the business, including in the software, technology, artificial intelligence, and manufacturing fields.
Regulatory, criminal and workplace investigations stemming from trade secrets, confidential supervisory information (“CSI”) and other corporate espionage considerations
Effective ways to protect valuable trade secrets and other proprietary information, including designing policies and procedures and with respect to recent rules that limit the availability of restrictive covenants such as noncompetes

Alex Gross, Annie Ostrager and Dan Richardson Examine Insulet’s Federal Circuit Roadmap for Trade Secret Defendants in Bloomberg Law

Experience

Given the sensitive nature of much of our trade secrets work for clients, many of our most significant matters remain confidential. Some of our public representations in this area include:

Lexeo Therapeutics in connection with defending against alleged theft of trade secrets claims and asserting counterclaims for trade secret misappropriation and breach of NDA against a competitor in the SDNY. S&C successfully convinced the court to dismiss the plaintiff’s unfair competition claim. Based on S&C’s dual offensive and defensive strategy, the plaintiff then settled the remaining claims on favorable terms with no admission of liability.
Advanced Comfort Technologies, Inc.—better known as Intellibed—in obtaining the dismissal of all claims in a suit filed against it in Utah by Purple Innovations, Inc. in which Purple accused Intellibed of patent infringement, theft of trade secrets, and unfair competition
A Major Technology Company in connection with a competitor’s hiring of senior technical employees and potential trade secret misappropriation by an employee suspected of stealing sensitive data and intellectual property

ASM, a leading supplier of semiconductor wafer processing equipment, in resolving misappropriation of trade secrets claims brought in Arizona state court by its chief, and larger, rival—Applied Materials, related to the threatened use of supposed trade secrets by a former employee of Applied who was hired by ASM. S&C successfully opposed Applied’s motions for emergency injunctive relief and expedited discovery and after S&C’s motion to dismiss the complaint was fully briefed, the parties agreed to settle.
Evertz Technologies in connection with substantial California trade secret misappropriation litigation, including defeating two successive injunction motions
Goldman, Sachs & Co. at the TCW/Gundlach trade secret misappropriation trial, in a case arising from Gundlach’s departure from TCW and his establishment of a competing investment advisory business, DoubleLine Capital
Micro Systems Engineering, Inc. (MSEI) in obtaining a trial victory against Universal Instruments Corp. in a case alleging copyright, trade secret and contractual claims. Following a six-day jury trial, the court granted MSEI’s motion for judgment as a matter of law. S&C obtained an affirmance of that ruling from the Second Circuit.
Rivington Partners, which is part of Applied Underwriters, in a case brought by Beazley Furlonge Limited asserting a claim for misappropriation of trade secrets
Terran Biosciences and the University of Maryland, Baltimore (UMB) in a trade secret misappropriation and related torts case pending in federal court in Maryland against a competitor, Compass Pathfinder Limited, that is alleged to have stolen trade secrets from UMB under the guise of a non-disclosure agreement
Ubiquiti in responding to a data extortion attack followed by a self-styled whistleblower’s public claim that the company had deficient cybersecurity and covered up the attack. The company faced federal and state enforcement inquiries, and putative class action and derivative litigation. Working with law enforcement, we identified the perpetrator: the self-styled “whistleblower,” who led cloud security for the company. He was prosecuted and convicted, and all litigation and investigations were voluntarily dismissed with no cost to our client.