Amazon sues former AWS VP over non-compete deal
geekwire.com
geekwire.com
As you'll notice from the article, Amazon seems to try to enforce the non-compete every few years, I'm guessing mostly as a message to existing Amazon employees. All I've every seen it do is piss off their employees.
That said, it's totally possible to leave Amazon and move on to an actual competitor. You just have to get lawyers involved. Oracle's Bare Metal Cloud org, that I work for, is made up of roughly 75% ex-aws staff (Amazon has been hemorrhaging staff to Oracle because better pay, and way better working conditions) Lawyers on both sides end up negotiating back and forth and you just end up not working on anything related to what you were working on for AWS.
And they don't even win when they bring it up in court; iirc, last time they tried this they wound up having to pay a full salary for the time that they wanted to prevent the ex-employee from working.
I don't like to generalize, but business lawyers are soulless asshats.
Definitely. Hearing such stories, even if Amazon came calling tomorrow to recruit me, I'd stay away. No one wants their former employer holding a veto over future employment.
It demolished my opinion of the soccer group that they are making 22 year olds sign non competes.
(I did tell him the non-compete was void in California, but he still didn't want to deal with it)
You have more bargaining power than the coach who needs the reference and the income.
Please help make life better for the next coach.
You can't be threatened or retaliated against.
I say this based on my experience with civic activism. A surprisingly small number of people who are willing to speak up can have a large/oversized impact.
Power is not granted - power is demanded/taken.
One person who tells the other parents can make change happen.
Your answer is the answer of learned helplessness.
I may not be totally tuned into Oracle's reputation, but this seems incredibly damning to Amazon.
I can't speak to the rest of Oracle, my only experience is from here in the bare metal cloud org, but it's:
1) Better pay.
2) Better hours (you don't keep having to work ridiculous hours to keep afloat.) In over a year I've done barely a dozen late nights, and at least half of those were totally unavoidable. In every case management has strenuously forced me to recoup my time. One thing I really hated was watching staff just constantly burn out in various teams across AWS (I was lucky, my team in AWS was actually one of the good ones.)
3) An obsession with the operational burden (easier to operate == more resilient platform, happier staff and happier customers).
4) Middle management who actively push back, and a senior management tier who both listen, and juggle staff around as appropriate to ensure things get done on time. AWS is a constant feature mill, and it comes across in the marketing language etc. This is only fuelled because middle managers right across the org are either unwilling to say no, or have no authority to do so. From the differences I've seen with managers there, it really seems like the former. Some managers really do make a huge difference (and indeed, the only reason I entertained the possibility of joining Oracle was because I knew several good managers who'd moved across)
I'm not sure what I can / cannot say regarding customers we're picking up. Don't want to mess things up for the marketing team :)
Some public material, of which more is bound to be forthcoming: https://www.oracle.com/uk/customers/yellowdog-1-iaas.html
OCPU: 36 Memory: 512GB Local Disk: 28.8TB NVMe SSD
That easily mops the floor with AWS and Google on price/performance ratio for running high end database servers. I suppose that shouldn't come as a huge surprise that Oracle's cloud offering would be good for running databases.
x1.32xlarge is double in every respect.
i3.16xlarge is 64 threads (200 ECU), 488 GB RAM, 15 TB SSD, $4.992 per hour.
Seems competitive.
Anyway, my point was that it didn't, IMHO, "easily mop the floor with AWS on price/performance ratio".
What does Oracle claim? I see here they say 1 million IOPS.[2]
[1] https://aws.amazon.com/blogs/aws/ec2-instance-type-update-t2...
[2] http://www.biwasummit.org/biwa/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/84...
In terms of success rates, they vary from niche to niche. I'm in Europe and here they're struggling a bit, because 1) their reputation for arbitrary price fluctuations doesn't really entice people to move to *aas, 2) a lot of their customers are big companies operating in strict regulatory conditions, 3) they really pissed off a lot of people by basically dropping any on-premise development beyond the bare minimum.
>watching staff just constantly burn out in various teams
Those are typical examples of a toxic org that uses forced ranking / stack ranking as a weapon rather than any real measure of performance. I don't think that's unique to AWS. It's nice to hear Oracle is so much better even if it's anecdotal.
My Oracle recruiter's tone made me believe this even more. So take OP (and my) anecdote with some salt.
>I may not be totally tuned into Oracle's reputation, but this seems incredibly damning to Amazon.
"bare metal" is a very special high-priority org in Oracle, pretty different from the rest of the company. Potemkin ... err ... Elison's cloud village.
I've had Amazon recruiters trying to bring me in for an interview for several years now but keep avoiding it because of their reputation for sledgehammer management style. Am I on target here or is this unfounded?
If you were an employer, and you had two candidates - one from Amazon, bound by a mountain of non-competes, and one from Google, who isn't - which would you choose?
Maybe the Amazon person is a bit better, but they also come with the possibility of six figures in legal fees.
The problem is, if you're an individual, it's a huge pain in the ass to duke this sort of thing out. You might even get unlucky in a cut-and-dry case, simply by virtue of not having much money to spend on it.
This is a perfect encapsulation of political reality in 21st century USA.
Corporations run every aspect of our government, no one else has a meaningful voice.
"You want it to be one way. But it's the other way."
Just can't get pass all the language. It doesn't bug me too much, but when your TV is in the living room with lots of people around, it's not exactly something you can turn up loud.
You're right in the most technical sense, in that all of human social reality comes back to "us". But blaming complacency, rather than the exponentially more difficult problem "we" have to solve, is completely bizarre.
First we need to ask if the law was fair. What are the real concerns of the other side. Did the law address them fairly? Just because you are biased doesn't excuse you from understanding the other side and ensuring that you are fair to them.
Next, you need to ensure that you knowledgeable and involved with other issues. You boycotting alone is meaningless as you ultimately are small compared to people who are not in the industry. Everybody has concerns about their domain that nobody else knows about. Are you informed and helping in the local nurse/hospital depute? What about the retails workers issues (the types of people who enjoy working at wal-mart overall)...
Purchasing from companies whose ethics you agree with makes sense but that isn't going to stop lobbying or change how laws are passed. That battle will only be won through politics and politicians. Get involved politically and/or hold your politicians accountable.
Using food safety as a simple example: vote for food safety regulations (vote with your vote) or don't buy from companies that poison people through negligence (vote with your dollars). Which world would you rather take your elderly grandparents out to dinner in?
Voting with your dollars is a pale shadow of your actual voice in a democratic society.
Reality speaks otherwise. Money gives you a voice. That's why lobbying exists.
I mean, they could have, but they didn't. You can't pin the blame (Or even dilute it a bit) for American slavery on a Frenchman wearing a cotton shirt.
By now one would think all US states would be eager to imitate California and simply reject non-competes. I think Colorado is close but not quite as radical.
[1] https://www.geekwire.com/2017/scaled-back-bill-aimed-providi...
[2] http://app.leg.wa.gov/billsummary?BillNumber=1967&Year=2017
Corporations have a voice, they might even have the biggest voice (except many corporations have conflicting voices, just like people) but they don't yet run every aspect of the government. Honestly if they did I would expect things to be a lot more efficient, at the expense of certain liberties.
Trump has been more corporatist than even Obama or W or Clinton...not sure how far back you'd have to go to find a President more focused on the needs of corporations over other citizens.
Obviously this is a long shot, but if this happened often enough to become a problem for Amazon, they might remove the non-compete clause from their employment contracts.
Agree that this pisses off not just prospective hires but also existing employees.
I would highly recommend the same to anyone else. Absolutely worth the time and money to be safe and covered if you still live / work somewhere they are enforceable.
During my my interview process one of the potential employers even asked to see any non-compete and NDAs that I had with my current employer, before they would move forward. Because they want to make sure they are in the clear too.
I suppose it could hurt in some situations, but I feel its best to be open and honest about the situation. If you are changing careers, you may be safe to not bring it up, but otherwise at least talk to your own lawyer.
Someone caught behind a harsh-and-enforceable noncompete could certainly find getting hired very tricky. At that point they might well have to move - for instance, to California where out-of-state noncompetes are (usually) void.
Plus it relies on the new employer being willing to indemnify you, which many would refuse. Did you get that assurance in writing by the way?
Many of these noncompete disputes seem to boil down less to legalise, and more to a company's weight class. If an Amazon or a Google, sues a startup for a noncompete, then the startup will lose, even if they're legally right (legal fees, injunctions, travel costs (assuming inconvenient court, etc).
And I suppose I was lucky that my employer was willing to do it, but they did do so in writing. Their lawyer already looked over everything and agreed, so was low risk to them.
And yes I could see the problem with large going after small. Which is a whole other issue. At least in Virginia non-competes are very strict on how they can be enforced. If something is deemed 'too broad' it will be thrown right out. And it has to be a similar position at a direct competitor. I think a small company does have a fair chance against big ones in these situations, at least here. Unless of course they really are breaching the non-compete.
(Edit) I suppose my point should be, cover yourself as much as you can. Not everyone may get as lucky as I did, but at least try. The last thing you want is to end up blindsided by a situation such as this story.
I suppose there's an argument that being employee-friendly about this is a good move for companies. After all, they reviewed the contract and shelled out to hire you, so they're clearly accepting some risk over the issue.
Amazon threatens and blusters over noncompetes to retain staff, but someone who promises to fight unrealistic noncompetes might gain an advantage in hiring new staff - especially from places like Amazon.
It was a hassle, but not nearly as bad as having to get my own lawyer and such.
Note, if you are ever in this situation you should not let yourself stagnate. Someday they will decide your knowledge isn't worth the price they are paying and release you. If you have nothing to show for your time nobody will hire you and that is your own fault. I recommend grad school, or get a degree in something else, or make it your full time job to work on open source projects.
Generally courts frown on non-competes: they fail to meet the standards of a contract as there is no consideration from one side and a person has the right to support themselves using their knowledge and experience. Courts are sympathetic only when you are taking specific knowledge to the new company and that is a higher bar than most non-competes can meet.
Was that spelled out in your contract, or was this wishful thinking on your part?
If the former, that's a reasonable non-compete.
Amazon non-competes do not include any such clauses.
Even though non-competes are illegal in California, a company can be a jerk about it and force you to court to get it thrown out--which will take a long time and be expensive.
“When we looked at their offerings and what Smartsheet does, it is two
totally different worlds,” said Mader. Using Amazon’s logic, Mader said
that Smartsheet would be a viewed as a competitor to Amazon Prime because
both services make people more productive.
"AWS currently offers numerous cloud-based productivity products for businesses—i.e., products designed to streamline work processes—including products for corporate email and calendaring, document storage and collaboration, virtual meetings, video calls, and chats, and virtual desktops. AWS’s product offerings are in constant development....AWS competes with Smartsheet (Amazon will submit to the court more detailed information regarding these efforts, under seal, and attorneys eyes only, at the appropriate time)....Shortly before he left AWS, he worked on a critical component of [REDACTED] and received extensive confidential information about how [REDACTED]."
"Users can comment on files, send them to others for feedback, and upload new versions without having to resort to emailing multiple versions of their files as attachments. Users can take advantage of these capabilities wherever they are, using the device of their choice, including PCs, Macs, tablets and phones. Amazon WorkDocs offers IT administrators the option of integrating with existing corporate directories, flexible sharing policies and control of the location where data is stored."
It is fair to say a VP knows the DETAILED plans of that division enough that doing the same thing for a competitor should be a problem. However VP experience should let him go to a competitor in a different division as his knowledge of the plans should be vague enough as to not matter.
Or just set up companies such you are employed by company in CA.
Obvious issues I can see are "don't put that in writing, pull the offer and don't say why" or "no, it's not adhesion at all, we just don't like any of these specific changes, you're welcome to try again!"
Not sure what you mean by getting in writing. It is what it is.
- While these types of contracts are not illegal per se, there exists a very real possibility for unconscionability. In addition, in the event of an ambiguity, such ambiguity will be resolved contra proferentem against the party drafting the contract language.
In my opinion, a non-compete is something that needs to be separately negotiated and compensated, rather than lumping it into "employment." If you agree to a non-compete, you are paid $X in exchange. If you violate the non-compete, you must pay $X back (and there could be a negotiated multiplier, e.g. $3X). In the absence of agreement, the legal default should be 1:1. If you are paid nothing for a non-compete, it is unenforceable. If you are paid $1, you must pay $1, and so on.
This gives each side an opportunity to value and agree upon the non-compete apart from the job itself. Eventually, most industries would settle on standards.
I'm no lawyer so I may be totally wrong on this.
This is still not ideal. The best is to ban non-competes or make them even more expensive.
From economical perspective for ecosystem, non-competes are bad. They reduce the competition and may force some talented person to be underutilized below potential. Plus open whole class of abuse. "Our flipping burger strategy is so unique that you couldn't do it elsewhere"
https://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/15/upshot/when-the-guy-makin...
Non competes treat employees like they have no value and are mere slaves or sharecroppers.
I especially like the ones where you have a contract that is for 3-6 months and they want a non-compete for multiple years.
How about this, if a company really wants a non-compete, then make sure they are paid fully above salary, otherwise this is just ownership of skilled labor.
This seems like the sort of thing that should give someone pause when interviewing with Amazon for a job.
When I interviewed there I made some brief remarks about the downsides to consolidation to one of the 8~ people they had me talk to that day. His face turned a little sour. I wonder if it was that or my salary demands that made them not extend an offer to me. Oh well ;)
In my estimation I clobbered the phone tech screen. I clobbered all of their board work except the first early morning one. I did sort of muddle through that one. I got through it, but not with all that much glitter and glam.
I don't think I interviewed like a madman sociopath, but subjective things like personality are the hardest things for me to defend my performance in ;)
It's also important to stay unemotional, e.g., treat it at the same level as what your office chair looks like. You just want them to agree, not start wondering if you are a good fit.
I personally dislike non-competes but the point is to get it removed, not make some big statement. (Unless your goal is to make a statement, not get the job under desirable conditions.)
All your interviewers will tell you is that they couldn't possibly comment on such a subject, and move on.
I think I failed my interview at Blizzard when I brought up them firing a ton of people -- I just wanted to know how secure my job was, and wanted to know their perception of the firing being on the inside.
In reality, though, they would probably not take such a case and simply let the lower court's ruling stand.
It turns out that either they were wrong in what the common law said, or else it has evolved differently in the years since then, because California's explicitly codified provision has turned out to have much more teeth than the common-law rule it was intended to restate. But they were of the opinion that these kinds of contracts should already have been voided at common law. Unfortunately the codification movement lost steam or else it might've ended up in the law of many other states [2].
[1] This is the modern descendant of that section: http://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/codes_displaySection...
[2] A bit on that here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Dudley_Field_II#Dedicati...
Of course, there could be some batshit crazy application of the commerce clause (wouldn't be the first time), but that could go either way.
http://www.adamsdrafting.com/if-you-want-exclusive-jurisdict...
(can't vouch for it... I'm not a lawyer nor did I review it much.)
Given that many contracts are with parties across state lines, yet subject to some state's law, I have to assume that there is a substantial set of precedents which have established how to properly set jurisdiction/venue. It won't be a new problem.
I.e., to do it the same way California did it, would mean passing a new federal law, not a new ruling along constitutional grounds.
If developers and fast food workers alike feel compelled to move to California to escape the yoke of constricting and onerous non-compete agreements, there's an argument to be made that it's a meaningful impact to interstate commerce.
The irony is that his boss is forcing this on them because she quit her job and brought a bunch of her former coworkers with her in order to start her business, and she doesn't want anyone to do the same to her.
What it means is my friend essentially can't find another job without either:
A. Moving (which is not an easy choice if you have a family) or
B. Subjecting himself to a significantly increased commute
This means his current employer can essentially take advantage of him, as she knows he won't be going anywhere unless the situation becomes truly unbearable.
I'm often hit up by Amazon recruiters and I've talked to a few before and got the sense (just by their tone) its not some place I want to be working. They also were deceptive in their recruiting tactics.
My manager went from AWS to Azure and it was no big deal. He even finished out his 2 weeks and our director gave him a farewell at our (director level) all hands.
But let's talk this through. Assuming we all agree we don't like them, what's the alternative? There seem to exist obvious negative consequences of them not existing in any form.
Wouldn't large companies such as Google, Amazon etc be able to poach any employee of let's say a startup competitor, by simply paying way more, therefore being able to steal ideas, technology, etc?
Or even amongst (well-capitalized) companies of any size: a free-for-all for employees within industries, good or bad? Maybe not so bad actually.. what say you?
Seriously asking because I'm trying to envision the positives and negatives of them being outlawed..
The government's role becomes that of watchdog against monopolies. Employees should have the right to work wherever they like.
Where I live, it's only possible to sign a contract to get paid not to compete after you leave. If you start competing, you lose the pay.
The above isn't just speculation. In a previous job I made third party scan tools for cars. One manufacture didn't provide their legally mandated documentation. When lawyers contacted them about it they panicked and shipped us their source code and the above is what we did. (giving us source code doesn't meet the legal requirements, but at least it was enough that we could get our features working)
If the CA tech scene has shown us anything, it's that companies will do just fine without relying on repressive & anti-competitive employment contracts.
Very likely prohibitively expensive for a lot of employers. Suppose you're a small-business owner with a great product, albeit with a limited but growing customer base. You work where cost of living is much lower than SV. $100K for a developer is pretty good pay, and you can't afford to pay, say, $125K per year. One of the "big guys" offers some of your devs $200K per year remote to bring their knowledge and reimplement a knock-off. You're sunk, and not because you are too hard-hearted to pay better salaries.
I'm not saying the current non-compete system is optimal (I've been bitten by it), but some reasonable level of protection needs to exist or we'll descend into (near) monopoly territory even more rapidly than we currently are.
There's also the misunderstanding that everything you sign is binding, it's not uncommon in CA for employees to sign what looks like a non-compete, and then believe that it is enforceable. Very few people have a lawyer, or can afford to pay a lawyer to review these agreements. Even fewer are brave enough not to sign them then and there.
I've seen some very egregious language before, one of my favorites was one that restricted the employee from working for any past, present, or future (defined as one year) customers of the employer--and their future employers from the same! I've got no idea how this was supposed to be enforced, but it caused the signee to be in fear of being sued.
If you are so valuable that a company is worried about you going to a competitor then they should have to put their money where there mouth is.
The circumstances are extremely limited [0]. In fact, California law says it's an unfair business practice even to require an employee to sign a noncompete, which could result in civil liability for damages [1].
[0] See, e.g., https://www.venable.com/enforcing-non-compete-provisions-in-...
[1] See, e.g., https://www.dorsey.com/newsresources/publications/2012/07/no...
I don't like non-compete agreements. They are now far away from their intended purpose. It's wrong to point fingers at a single company, though - the entire sector suffers from this.
I mean wouldnt both conservatives and liberals agree?
Ouch. Going right for the Amazon jugular right there.