When someone walks off with your confidential information, the right lawsuit can halt the bleeding and make them pay for it. We prosecute and defend trade secret claims under the federal Defend Trade Secrets Act and state law, and our engineering background helps us cut through the technical disputes over what the secret is and how it was used, which is where these cases are usually won or lost.
Federal and State Claims
The Defend Trade Secrets Act opens the federal courthouse and brings uniform national standards, injunctive relief, damages including exemplary damages for willful misappropriation, and attorneys' fees in exceptional cases. State laws, most based on the Uniform Trade Secrets Act, add or substitute their own remedies. We coordinate both tracks and account for the state-to-state variations that shape strategy, venue, and the relief you can realistically pursue.
Emergency Relief First
Trade secret cases move fast because the harm compounds every day the information stays in the wrong hands, and some of that harm can never be undone. We seek temporary restraining orders and preliminary injunctions to freeze the misappropriation while the case plays out. That means building the evidentiary record quickly and presenting a clear, credible showing of irreparable harm that a judge can act on under deadline pressure.
Departing Employee Disputes
Most of these fights start when an employee leaves for a competitor and takes more than their experience. We handle improper customer and employee solicitation, use of confidential information at a new employer, and breach of confidentiality agreements, pursuing claims against the former employee and the company that hired them. We also help you respond when the evidence is a hard drive or a download log rather than a smoking gun.
Defense and Damages
When you are the one accused, we attack the case at its weakest joints: whether the information is a trade secret at all, whether any misappropriation occurred, and defenses like independent development and reverse engineering. On the recovery side, we work with economists to prove actual loss, unjust enrichment, and reasonable royalty damages, and we pursue exemplary damages where the misappropriation was willful and malicious.