de la Cuesta v. Benham, 193 Cal. App. 4th 1287 (2011)

Citation: de la Cuesta v. Benham, 193 Cal. App. 4th 1287 (2011)
Parent Document: de la Cuesta v. Benham, 193 Cal. App. 4th 1287 (2011)
Jurisdiction: California (state)
Effective Date: 2011-03-29
Original Source: https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/5810133/de-la-cuesta-v-benham/ ↗

Full Text

1,304 chars

Ajaxo involved tripartite litigation between three companies: One which had breached a nondisclosure agreement (the breacher), one whose trade secret had been aired by the breaching company (the victim), and one which actually received the trade secret (the recipient). The victim company sought lost profits of $6 million per year from the date of disclosure, which by the time of trial amounted to $19.2 million. (Ajaxo, supra, 135 Cal.App.4th at p. 59, fn. 35.) But the victim company did not receive $19.2 million. It got $1.29 million in restitution instead—a recovery of less than 10 percent of its maximum figure. (See id. at p. 57.) The trial court determined that the victim company was the “prevailing party” despite an argument that it had not achieved “sufficient success” to qualify: Four of the victim company’s theories of liability were rejected, it lost a fight for a permanent injunction, *1299and it received “only a fraction of the damages it sought on its contract claim.” (Id. at pp. 58-59.) Despite those disappointments, the appellate court affirmed a prevailing party determination. The two factors it pointed to were (1) its contract claim resulted in a “simple, unqualified verdict on the breach of contract claim” and (2) the damages “in excess of’ $1 million. (Id. at p. 59.)

Other Sections in This Document (49)

Full Text