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Maybe, maybe not. Google lawyers did not respond to the lawsuit on his behalf; an independent law firm did.

Googles lawyers would always use an outside firm. Corporate in-house counsel are for creating corporate legal policy and coordinating with other lawyers for the actual lawsuits. They rarely litigate themselves.

If I was Google's legal team I'd throw this guy to the wolves to demonstrate to every other current Amazon employee what their employer will do to limit their career.

And demonstrate to everyone thinking about switching to Google from another company that Google will throw them to the wolves?

There's no way Google hired him without this kind of agreement in place. Amazon's relentless pursuit of non-compete enforcement is well known.

Which practice are you referring to in the last paragraph, AWS's, Google's or the employee's?

The practice of requiring and enforcing non-competes.