Eric Akira Tate

Practice Areas

Eric Akira Tate co-chairs the firm’s Global Employment and Labor Group. He represents technology and other companies in bet-the-company trade secrets and employee mobility cases. Eric also represents boards of directors in #MeToo and other sensitive internal investigations and disputes with executives, and companies in whistleblower, wrongful termination, discrimination and harassment, wage-and-hour, and other employment litigation. In addition, Eric counsels companies on employment law compliance and transactional matters, including enforceability of restrictive covenants and other personnel policies and procedures throughout the United States, employment aspects of mergers and acquisitions, and collective bargaining and traditional labor relations.

Eric recently represented Uber in its diligence investigation as part of its acquisition of Ottomotto, the autonomous vehicle startup founded by former Google engineers. He then helped lead Uber’s defense of the subsequent patent infringement and trade secrets misappropriation suit filed in 2017 by Waymo, which settled several days into trial in February 2018. In addition to technology companies, Eric has handled similar matters for companies across many industries, including, but not limited to, Williams Sonoma v. Restoration Hardware, International Lease Finance Co. v. Air Lease Corporation, Melaleuca, Inc. v. Shaklee Corporation, and New Century Mortgage v. Encore Credit.

Additionally, Eric is a thought leader and on the board of review for leading BNA treatises Trade Secrets: A State-by-State Survey; Covenants Not to Compete; Employee Duty of Loyalty; and Tortious Interference in the Employment Context. He is author of “Protecting Investments in IP and People” in Today’s General Counsel; “Workplace Bias and Gender Pay Equity in the Silicon Valley” in LJN Employment Law Strategist; “Trade Secrets and the Activision Case: Lessons for Employers and Employees” in the IP Litigator; “Protect Your Investments: Recent Developments in California Law Regarding Non-competition Agreements and Other Restrictive Covenants” in NVCA Today; “Microinequities: Can Bad Behavior Be Actionable?” in The National Law Journal; “The When, Who and How of Workplace Investigations” in The Practical Litigator; “The NLRB’s Decision in Browning-Ferris of California (2015) One Month Later: Is the Sky Falling for Employees?” in Morrison Foerster Employment Law Commentary; and “California Raises Bar for Employers Again: Gender Pay Bias Claims Set to Take Off with New Gender Pay Equity and Anti-Discrimination Law” in Bloomberg BNA Daily Labor Report.

Eric is a leader in the American Bar Association’s (ABA’s) Labor and Employment (LEL) Section and LEL’s Employment Rights and Responsibilities (ERR) Committee, serving as co-chair of the Covenants Not to Compete and Trade Secrets Subcommittee. Eric has also served as a past co-chair of the ABA LEL Annual Meeting Committee, the LEL Section Annual CLE Conference, ERR’s Alternative Dispute Resolution, Employment At-Will and Collateral Torts, and Worker Dislocation Subcommittees. In 2019, Eric was elected to the governing Council for the Labor and Employment Section. He also served on the Planning Committee for the National Employment Law Council’s Annual Conference.

Eric serves as a mediator for the Northern District of California’s Alternative Dispute Resolution Program, handling trade secrets and employee mobility, wage-and-hour, employment discrimination and harassment, and traditional labor relations matters.