What Are the Differences Between a Non-Compete and NDA?

A non-disclosure agreement (NDA) and a noncompete agreement can both be important for businesses. With both, the general idea is to keep your proprietary business information safe from competitors and prevent someone from leaving your business and using what they’ve learned there to directly compete with you. To decide on the best agreement for your needs, contact a contract attorney in Las Vegas to go over the details.

Non-Compete Agreement

The purpose of a noncompete agreement is to make sure that an employee in particular, but sometimes other entities as well, don’t leave their employment with you or end a contract working with you and then immediately go into direct competition by setting up their own company. These agreements typically have both a time and geographic limit. For example, they might specify that employee cannot set up their own business in the same field as you work within a year after leaving your employment and within 50 miles of your business.

These agreements are not enforceable in some state states but they are here in Nevada. However, they have to be formulated exactly right in order to be enforceable, so it it’s essential to have an attorney help you make sure that you cross all your t’s and dot all your i’s.

Generally, a Nevada court will look to see that these agreements are reasonable in their scope and duration, meaning that if you try to restrict someone for more than a couple of years at the longest, the agreement will probably get tossed out. The agreement also has to clearly protect your legitimate business interests rather than simply stifle competition or try to keep your employee from being able to pursue their own business to force them to continue working for you. Finally, the court looked to see that these are “fair,” which is a subjective standard but generally means that you can’t create undo hardships for your employee or make things too vague.

Non-Disclosure Agreement

A non-disclosure agreement simply restricts employees or independent contractors from disclosing any proprietary information or important restricted information about your company. These can be a bit broader than NDAs because the purpose is to protect your company’s position in the market and to ensure that you don’t have a competitor sneak someone in to take advantage of you. It also means that, even if a competitor hires an employee out from under you, they can’t get certain information out of that employee. They are only allowed to hire them for their talent: not for their knowledge of your company.

Talk to a Las Vegas Contracts Attorney Today

Whatever type of contract you need, it’s always best to draft it and have it reviewed by an attorney. That way you can have confidence it will stand up to challenges in court and provide you with exactly the protections that you expect. For help with your contracts, contact us at the Hutchings Law Group in Las Vegas, NV today. 

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