Restraints and Restrictive Covenants

Restraint of trade clauses are generally used to safeguard client and employee assets from exploitation, as well as protecting valuable confidential information. Such provisions are most common in employment contracts and business sale contracts.

This is highly litigated area of law, is highly complex, and it is important that you are provided with appropriate advice regarding the effects and enforceability of such restrictive covenants. Properly drafted restraints can be used to prevent a former employee from directly competing with a former employer or the poaching valuable clients and employees.

Beyond advising you on the validity of existing contractual restraints, we can also advise on:

• The potential effects of restraints on your future employment and business prospects, before entering into new employment.
• The use of urgent injunctions to stop dissemination of confidential information and damage to goodwill.
• How to best protect trade secrets, inventions, intellectual property and goodwill.
• The solicitation of clients within specific industries.
• The intersection of common law and statutory obligations within restraint disputes.
• A commercial approach to compensation once client relationships have been damaged.
• The use of alternative practices to achieve similar restraint outcomes (such as “garden leave”).

While we assist our clients in a wide variety of industries, we know that this are of law is relevant to some more than others. We have particular experience assisting businesses in the real estate, financial services and niece commercial retail industries, and can help you navigate and provide strategic advice in this particularly complex area of law.