Hall v. Edgewood Partners Insurance Center, Inc.

Hall and Thompson built a significant client base as brokers of equipment rental insurance. They brought some of their clients to a specialty division they formed at Hylant. USI paid a substantial sum for Hylant’s assets and to keep Hall and Thompson on as employees to continue building their client base; Hall and Thompson gave up any ownership interest in their clients and promised that if they were terminated, they would refrain from soliciting those clients for two years. They agreed that USI could assign their employment contracts to a subsequent purchaser. Edgewood bought out USI’s entire equipment rental insurance business. Hall and Thompson could not work out an arrangement with Edgewood, so USI terminated them. They began contacting their old clients and sought a declaratory judgment permitting them to do so. Edgewood obtained a preliminary injunction barring Hall and Thompson from breaching their non-solicitation agreements. The Sixth Circuit remanded for factual findings as to which of Thompson’s clients he recruited and developed solely on his own accord, and which clients Hylant and USI expended their resources in recruiting and developing, with respect to which Edgewood is likely to succeed on the merits. Edgewood has no legitimate interest in barring Thompson from soliciting clients who came to Hylant and USI solely to avail themselves of Thompson’s services and only as a result of his own independent recruitment efforts. View "Hall v. Edgewood Partners Insurance Center, Inc." on Justia Law