Getting the Least Out of a Nondisclosure Agreement
The Eighth Circuit affirmed a grant of judgment as a matter of law in SL Montevideo Technology, Inc. v. Eaton Aerospace, LLC, 2007 WL 2002543 (8th Cir. 2007).
SL Montevideo brought suit against Eaton Aerospace for trade secret misappropriation and breach of a nondisclosure agreement regarding an airplane motor. SL Montevideo could not establish the information was a trade secret, so it relied on the contract claim on appeal. The Eighth Circuit affirmed, noting that SL Montevideo somehow chose to structure the nondisclosure agreement as having a trade secret requirement:
To be sure, agreements such as the Proprietary Information Agreement (PIA) may protect broader categories of information than trade secrets. But the PIA's exclusions limited its protection to information having the same characteristics of secrecy and novelty as trade secret.
