Back in 2018, Netflix offered then-Activision chief financial officer Spencer Neumann a lucrative deal to oversee its finances, and Neumann accepted. The problem is, Neumann was contractually obligated to stay with Activision until 2021, so he hadn’t fulfilled his duty to the company when he accepted Netflix’s proposal. He was pink-slipped as a result but still ended up as Netflix’s new CFO in 2019, which places Netflix in a situation of having poached an employee — again.
Now, Activision Blizzard has finally launched a response to the streaming service’s actions. Today, the studio filed a lawsuit against Netflix that states it’s seeking injunctive relief for widespread damages. The suit also alleges that Netflix poached Neumann while it was in the middle of negotiating a deal with the publisher. Said deal would have allowed Netflix to distribute the company’s “linear media content.”
The teeth of Activision’s lawsuit come from the deal that Netflix made with Neumann, in which the Stranger Things distributor promised that it would protect him against the legal liabilities of his actions. In other words, Netflix apparently knew that it was encouraging Neumann to breach his contract. Activision is hoping that arguing this will strengthen its overall case, as it would prove Netflix knowingly and intentionally broke California’s employment laws.
As mentioned, this isn’t the first time Netflix has been accused of poaching talent. Back in 2016, Netflix hired two members of the now Disney-owned Fox, who also sued them in response. Fox didn’t get the money it was after, but Netflix was banned from poaching anymore of its employees. If Activision’s alleged evidence is accurate, then it’s likely that this lawsuit will result in a similar stipulation, only for future Activision Blizzard employees. The streamer is even facing similar litigation from ViacomCBS for snatching executives.
In all of its battles, Netflix has tried to justify its actions by claiming the company promotes employee “freedom” against the “Hollywood establishment.” That last bit is a tad ironic considering Netflix’s field of business, but it has allowed the company to get away with doing it repeatedly, so something about it must be appealing in court. It’ll be interesting to see if it holds up in the long run. If not, the streamer may have to go about collecting proficient employees the old fashion way.
Source: Deadline
![\"IT電腦補習](\"http://itteacheritfreelance.hk/test/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/logo2-2.png\"){kind=logo}
www.itsec.hk
www.itsec.vip
www.itseceu.uk
Leave a Reply