RIM sues Motorola for blocking hirings

Research In Motion filed a lawsuit against Motorola in a Chicago court on Wednesday, arguing that Motorola is improperly blocking  RIM from hiring recently fired Motorola workers.

In September, Motorola asked the Chancery Division of the Cook County Circuit Court to stop RIM from hiring Motorola workers, citing that a non-solicitation provision in an agreement that the two companies had entered into in February prevented RIM from doing this. However, the Canadian BlackBerry maker argues that Motorola is abusing the clause saying Motorola has "improperly and irresponsibly sought to expand the non-solicitation provision to prevent [RIM] from hiring any Motorola employees, including the thousands of employees Motorola has already fired or will soon fire, without regard for [RIM's] rights or for the damage this tactic will unfairly inflict on Motorola's own employees and ex-employees who will be prevented from finding new employment" with RIM.

RIM claims that the provision has expired, is not enforceable--or both. Nevertheless, the lawsuit says, "Motorola's position shamelessly ignores the fact that Motorola's massive layoffs, and not the RIM entities, have caused hundreds of Motorola employees to date to seek employment with the RIM entities."  

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