About one year after trying unsuccessfully to enforce a noncompetetition agreement against high level former executive David Johnson to prevent him from going to Dell, IBM is now seeking to prevent another high level employee from going to another alleged competitor.
As reported by Bloomberg Businessweek (here) and InformationWeek (here), IBM has turned its sights on 31-year IBM employee, Joanne Olsen. Olsen, a general manager in IBM’s technology services division, resigned from IBM to join Oracle. Olsen, who reportedly is bound by a noncompete, knows trade secrets and other confidential information of IBM, the protection of which IBM argues supports enforcement of the noncompete to bar Olsen from working for Oracle. A New York state judge has accepted the argument on a temporary basis. A further hearing is scheduled for tomorrow (June 26).