Law in Business Source: Saunders, K. M., & Golden, N. (2018). Skill or secret? — the line between trade secrets and employee general skills and knowledge. Journal of Law and Business, 15(1), 61-99.

This article primarily focuses on how employees should treat trade secrets legally. The authors argue that as agents or former agents of companies, employees should not disclose trade secrets or any other important confidently information to anyone. Neither should they use it. However, an employee is free to utilize general skills, knowledge, and/ or experience that he or she may have gained on a current or former job without being accused of trade secret misappropriation. This law is related to two legal concepts: employee mobility and protect competition. Nevertheless, the difference between general knowledge and trade secrets is usually not clear. Even the courts in different jurisdictions have not be consistent about what is what between the two. In this article, the authors document the results of a study that was undertaken to investigate the factors that most courts often use to differentiate between trade secrets and general knowledge in related cases.

This article is legally important since it addresses trade secrets law and the agency law. An agency relationship is one in which there is a principal on whose behalf and benefit an agent acts. Normally, the principal freely chooses an agent to act on their behalf. The choosing is essentially the delegation of authority to the agent to make him or her able to do some things legally for the principal. The delegation of authority could be actual or could be through the principal’s actions that may lead a third party to believe that an agent has the authority to do something on behalf of the principal.

An employee’s right to utilize their skill, experience...

In most cases, employees gain skills, knowledge, and also get refined from their employment experience. Nevertheless, it is difficult to differentiate between the employer’s crucial trade secrets and his or her employee’s general skills and knowledge. This is particularly difficult when the skills or knowledge of the employee are rare or superior. In most cases, the courts usually repeat the previous rule and do not explain the manner in which they arrived at their decision.
Source: Franck, J-U., & Peitz, M. (2018). Suppliers as forgotten cartel victims. Journal of Law & Business, 15(1), 17-59.

This article is all about the antitrust law. The antitrust law has frequently allowed purchasers of products from price fixing cartels to get compensation even when they are not the buyers but are instead downstream companies in the supply chain. The antitrust law, nevertheless, does not appreciate the facts that cartel suppliers are in a position that is similar to that of the purchasers of the cartel’s products in the sense that they also have to cut their output. They have to cut their output because high cartel prices often end up reducing demand and reducing the inputs that the cartels demand from the suppliers. The cartel suppliers often have to reduce their prices in response to reduced demand to sell more of their supplies. Thus, an overcharge by a cartel has effects not only on direct purchasers but also on the profits/ revenues of those on the backend of the supply chain. It has been argued severally that courts ought to modify the doctrine because it basically limits antitrust standing to direct buyers. Even though this would be a big change in the…