Adobe, Intel, Google, and Apple Reach Settlement in Employee Poaching Lawsuit
Silicon Valley’s biggest names got together to a reach a settlement in an employee poaching lawsuit. The case was filed against Apple, Google, Intel and Adobe in 2011 by tech sector workers. It stated that these tech giants limited job mobility for workers and thus limited salary growth too. Now these companies have come together for an agreement to settle the case.
Last year, U.S. District Judge Lucy Koh in San Jose, California, rejected the settlement amount of $324.5 million, calling it too low. The settlement was rejected after one of the complainant objected to the amount. That complainant has agreed to the new undisclosed settlement amount which was offered by the tech giants. Judge Lucy Koh has said that to match the earlier settlement, the amount must be at least $380 million to address the loss of potential wages to the employees.
The case is mostly based on the emails between Apple Co-founder Steve Jobs and ex-Google CEO Eric Schmidt along with heads of other rival companies. The emails detailed their plans to resist from poaching each others’ top engineers. This would lead to limited opportunity for the engineers to grow in the market.
The complainants (plaintiffs) will be filing a detailed explanation of the new deal “imminently”. The Judge will then have the option of accepting or rejecting the settlement. Guess the lesson from this case is to be good at your job, but not that good that your employer will try to keep you in forever.
