breach-of-contract non-disclosure
What options are available to plaintiff if defendant breaks NDA and goes ahead with deal on their own?
<p>I work on acquisitions/sales of companies. I showed ABC Co. ownership a potential acquisition (XYZ Co.) that they passed on. A few months later, ABC Co. themselves was for sale. ABC's private equity ownership group sold  ABC...and then the new private equity owners (with some ABC management still in place) bought the company I showed them. The NDA was still in effect and management team wouldn't have even known of the existence of the company had we not shown it to them. </p>

<p>What is the recourse here? To complicate things, I am no longer with the firm that confidentiality agreement was with. I have since opened my own shop. Thanks for any advice on this.</p>

<p>Here is my interpretation of the facts. W (which includes you and some others) have an NDA with company A, which prohibits A from using any material information provided by W, for two years. A was then sold to B, and B used that information contrary to the NDA. Therefore: W can sue B for damages, because they breached the agreement. The obligation is not extinguished when B buys A.</p>

<p>You are no longer part of W: can <em>you</em> sue B for damages? It depends in whether you have a property interest in the protected information / relation. For example, if you were just a wage employee of W and you quite, you probably have no property interest in the information. If you were a partner and were bought out, there will surely be some written statement of the division of company property. You might have bargained away that right in exchange for more cash; or you might have retained the interest. If you have a property interest in the protected info, you could sue for (your share of the) damages. This is about who has standing. The only credible remedy would be a monetary award, that is, you shouldn't expect that the courts would order the sale to be rescinded. </p>
