A party seeking to enforce a restrictive covenant must plead and prove the existence of one or more legitimate business interests. Fla. Stat. § 542.335. The proponent typically claims to have a legitimate business interest in its trade secrets, valuable confidential information that otherwise does not qualify as a trade…
One cornerstone needed to enforce a valid restraint on trade is the requirement to be in writing and “signed by the person against whom enforcement is sought.” Fla. Stat. § 542.335. Courts use this requirement to reject enforcement of restrictive covenants that are not in writing or signed by the…
“Florida law … contains a comprehensive framework for analyzing, evaluating and enforcing restrictive covenants contained in employment contracts.” Vital Pharmaceuticals, Inc. v. Alfieri, 23 F. 4th 1282, 1291 (11th Cir. 2022) (quotation and citation omitted). This framework includes a burden shifting approach between the restrictive covenant’s enforcer and enforcee that…
In the absence of a non-compete agreement, Florida law prohibits tortious interference with certain business relationships. The Supreme Court of Florida, in Tamiami Trail Tours, Inc. v. Cotton, 463 So.2d 1126 (Fla. 1985), explained that the elements of a claim for tortious interference with a business relationship are “(1) the…
Florida law protects employers and similarly situated persons from unlawful competition. But every competitive act does not qualify as an unlawful competitive act. White v. Mederi Caretenders Visiting Services of Se. Florida, LLC, 226 So. 3d 774 (Fla. 2017) (“Section 542.335 does not protect covenants ‘whose sole purpose is to…
We previously wrote about two potential laws that might limit enforceability of non-compete agreements. The first law is a proposed Florida statute that would constrain or prohibit restrictive covenants for certain medical professionals. The second law is a Federal Trade Commission rule that would ban most non-compete agreements as unfair…
Nationwide, the body of law regulating non-compete agreements (including non-solicitation covenants, non-circumvention covenants, covenants barring poaching of employees) has been mainly regulated by state statutes as well as court decisions in state and federal courts. Federal law has generally stayed out of the regulation of restrictive covenants. About a year…
Plaintiffs often assert the common law cause of action of tortious interference in conjunction with other claims associated with unlawful competition. This is because the elements needed to prove the common law tort frequently use the same or substantially similar facts as those needed to establish breach of a restrictive…
The Florida restrictive covenant statute allows employers to restrain employees from working for a competitor so long as the non-competition agreement is supported by a legitimate business interest and is reasonable in time, area, and line of business. Fla. Stat. 542.335. Employees that enter contracts containing non-compete agreements can be…
Some employers have confronted the situation where employees have taken corporate trade secrets to use in competition against their former employer, but the employees had not signed a non-compete agreement. Under Florida law, however, the fact that the former employees did not sign a non-compete agreement is not dispositive concerning…