Legal Question in Employment Law in California

Re: California non-compete validity

Non-competes are, for the most part, illegal in California -- with a few exceptions for highly- compensated executives with stock option agreements. . . The company likely would not be able to enforce a California non-compete, but might, if it felt the need to do so, file for a restraining order in the parent-company state. That order would likely not be enforceable in California, but might be enforced elsewhere -- this possibility sometimes creates a "race to the courthouse" scenario, where you would want to file a claim with a California court to invalidate the non-compete, before the company filed in another state (assuming that it was worth spending the legal fees to do so. . . .)

(Non-competes aside, there is another way that a company can argue for future non-competition -- a very narrow legal concept that has some support in California, called "inevitable disclosure." If your work at a subsequent employer would cause "inevitable disclosure" of the former company's trade secrets, the former employer could sue to prevent the future employment -- but that's a tough case for the former employer to make.)