Microsoft, Google, Lee Settle Hiring Dispute

linumax wrote to mention that Google, Microsoft, and Kai-Fu Lee have reached an agreement, after months of negotiation. From the article: "In a brief statement released late Thursday, Microsoft spokesman Jack Evans said the parties had entered into a private agreement that resolved all issues to their mutual satisfaction. He also declined to give any details on the agreement, saying the terms were confidential and that all parties had agreed to make no other statements to the media regarding it. However, he did say that Microsoft was 'pleased with the terms of our settlement with Google and Dr. Lee.'" We originally reported on this back in July.

Comments

Re:How Is This A Rights Issue?

[Michalson]

You don't know all the facts concerning the case.

- Microsoft hired Mr Lee, with a generous salary and bonus, to be in charge of developing a specific, and very valuable, asset. Namely the improvement of interface technologies/web interfaces for Asian customers, something that has become very important to global companies with China moving into the IT age. As a condition of his handsome salary, Mr Lee signed a contract saying he would not work in that specific area for a certain amount of time after leaving Microsoft, so that he could not sell Microsoft technology to someone else.

- Mr Lee and Google began to communicate on Microsoft time. In those communications Mr Lee sent Google information on specific people Google should hire in order to create a shadow version of Microsoft's own Asian UI division, with the understanding that he would be in charge of it.

- In those same communications, Google identified the fact that Mr Lee's contract made such a venture a very big violation. Knowing this, Google communicated various loopholes and ways to hide what he was doing, suggesting things like Google putting him on a fake paid "vacation" (in which he would actually be working, but done of the record in order to deceive any court that investigated the matter) for a number of months so that he could violate his contract while avoiding the penalties.