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http://tech.mit.edu/V134/N21/long2.html
Apple, Google, Intel, Adobe settle hiring collusion suit
By Nick Bilton
THE NEW YORK TIMES
April 25, 2014
SAN FRANCISCO — Four major Silicon Valley companies, including Apple and
Google, settled a high-profile suit Thursday over charges that they
conspired not to hire one another’s workers, according to a court filing
Thursday.
Technology employees filed a class-action lawsuit in 2011 against Apple,
Google, Intel and Adobe, saying the tech companies violated federal
antitrust laws by conspiring for several years to suppress the pay of
employees by agreeing to not poach employees from one another.
Terms of the settlement were not disclosed, but the plaintiffs had argued
that the lost wages added up to $3 billion. Three smaller settlements with
other defendants, including Lucasfilm, Pixar and Intuit, were reached last
year for $20 million.
“This is an excellent resolution of the case that will benefit class
members,” Kelly M. Dermody, a lawyer with Lieff Cabraser Heimann &
Bernstein, the defendants’ legal team, said in a press release. “We look
forward to presenting it to the Court and making the terms available.”
The lawsuit included 64,613 software engineers and accuses the companies of
agreeing not to solicit one another’s employees in a scheme developed and
enforced by Steve Jobs, then chief executive of Apple. A trial was set to
begin in May.
The lawsuit exposed emails between Jobs and Google executives discussing
their agreement.
In one exchange, Jobs emailed Sergey Brin, co-founder of Google, “If you
hire a single one of these people, that means war.” |
