Contracts: Breach-Misappropriation of Trade Secrets-Limitation of Liability

Plaintiff hired defendant to develop a website for plaintiff. The parties soon engaged in litigation regarding fundamental disagreements about the terms of the contract. A jury returned a verdict in favor of defendant on its claims for breach, unjust enrichment and misappropriation of trade secrets. The district court reduced defendant’s award pursuant to the contract’s limitation-of-liability clause, and further reduced the award after finding insufficient evidence that defendant undertook reasonable efforts to maintain the secrecy of some of its trade secrets at issue. The parties cross-appealed from the judgment.

Where defendant failed to tell plaintiff that certain of defendant’s technologies disclosed to plaintiff were trade secrets, the jury properly found that the information of those technologies were not entitled to trade secrets protection.

Judgment is affirmed.

Walmart Inc. v. Cuker Interactive LLC (MLW No. 74538/Case No. 18-1959 – 17 pages) (U.S. Court of Appeals, 8th Circuit, Erickson, J.) Appealed from U.S. District Court, Western District of Arkansas, Brooks, J. (Eric John Magnuson, of Minneapolis, MN for appellant; Ryan W. Marth, of Minneapolis, MN., Luke A. Hasskamp, of La Jolla, CA., Kelvin Collado, of Minneapolis, MN on brief) (Joseph S. Grinstein, of Houston, TX for appellee; Jess Askew, III, of Little Rock, AR., Andrew King, of Little Rock, AR., Vineet Bhatia, of Houston, TX., Neal S. Manne, of Houston, TX., Elisha B. Barron, of New York, NY)