Trade secret
The term “Trade secret” is not expressly defined anywhere because it was evolved gradually at both the U.S. state and federal level. Primarily it was mentioned in 1979 when the uniform law commission published the Uniform Trade Secrets Act (“UTSA”). Furthermore, in 2016 a few sets of definitions were passed by congress in the Defend Trade Secrets Act (“DTSA”). Later various definitions came across in multiple judgments but few elements were common in all which are mentioned below.
A trade secret is a secret recipe that runs the company mainly:-
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It is secret or confidential for others
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It has monetary value or competitive advantage in the market
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The owner made an effort to maintain the secrecy of such information.
As a rule, every company has some sort of trade secret. Mainly, Trade secrets can be anything that provides an economic edge to its competitors. It protects a vast scale of information unless not protected under copyright, trademark or patent law. It includes any recipe, formulae, algorithms, database, customer list, strategic plans etc.
Renowned Trade secrets
Longevity of Trade secret
Trade secrets do not get registered by any government agencies. Therefore, the ways of its protection are different from other intellectual property. Mainly, they get secured by other means such as contracts, non-compete forms, NDA and other documents. These documents draft guidelines to prevent the acquainted person from sharing the secrets of a trade secret with others. Attorneys purposely design such contracts or agreements to limit the person’s ability from disseminating them to the company’s competitors or with others for maintaining the secrecy of trade secrets.
The attorney must clearly state the terms in the contract. Due to not getting registered by any government office, the attorney has free will to decide the expiry date of the document created for protection. Therefore, it is inevitable to mention the date in the said document regarding its expiration period. If the trade secret is released in public or no longer remains confidential eventually, the holder will lose his rights over the secret and lose its protection.