Chapter 1253: Anti-Compet.i.tion Agreement
Eric was stunned. He had not expected Boss Pei to say something like that.
What did I do to deserve this?
Eric knew very well that even though there were many objective factors in his failure, sometimes he was held back by the higher-ups, and sometimes it was because IOI was indeed different from GOG… no matter what, he had lost!
He was completely defeated by Boss Pei. He was beaten up badly.
What’s more, Tengda was filled with talents. GOG was such an impressive game. Version update, system design balance, operational activities, E-Sports compet.i.tions, and other aspects. Boss Pei would definitely not be able to do these things himself. These tasks were all handled by Tengda’s internal employees.
These employees could not be underestimated even if Boss Pei’s huge role was excluded!
Why else would Tengda Games be said to be the core department of the entire Tengda Corporation? Anyone could open a new industry and expand Boss Pei’s business empire.
In the end, Boss Pei was not satisfied with the person-in-charge of GOG? He even said that he had wanted to replace him a long time ago?
Give me this seat?
Eric felt that this was quite unreal. However, looking carefully at Boss Pei’s expression, he seemed to be very serious. He was not joking at all.
Thus, he began to think about this possibility.
Pei Qian suddenly realized a problem seeing Eric fall silent. “Aiya, I overlooked a problem.”
“You’re considered a high-level executive of Dayak Corporation. Don’t tell me you’ve signed an anti-compet.i.tion agreement?”
“How much would we have to pay for breaching the contract if you were poached?”
It was fine if it was small companies, but large companies basically signed anti-compet.i.tion agreements and confidentiality agreements with the higher-ups to prevent compet.i.tors from maliciously poaching them.
The confidentiality agreement was very easy to understand. In other words, even if employees left their jobs, they could not leak or take away company secrets. Otherwise, they would have to bear the corresponding responsibility.
Otherwise, wouldn’t it be a complete mess if the higher-ups jumped s.h.i.+p and brought the company’s secrets to their compet.i.tor’s company?
As for the anti-compet.i.tion agreement, it had similar restrictions, but the specific restrictions were different.
Generally speaking, compet.i.tion agreements were mainly targeted at key positioning and indispensable upper echelons. They were limited to not being able to do part time jobs in similar businesses during their working period. They could not join companies in the same field as compet.i.tors after leaving.
Different companies had different regulations as to how long this ‘period’ was. However, it was usually two years. After all, it would be meaningless if it was too short.
Of course, the contents of the agreement could not be too broad.
For example, a certain company had written in the anti-compet.i.tion agreement that employees were not to join any internet companies domestically or overseas for the next two years after leaving. That was too much. That was because the concept of internet companies was too broad. Didn’t that mean that employees could not go to any company with any form of digital business?
Therefore, they would usually be precise to a certain area, such as social media software, shopping websites, and so on.
Games companies would often state that they were not allowed to join other games companies nor were they allowed to create their own games companies.
Alternatively, he could also clearly state that he could not join a few companies and clearly write the names of the companies. These companies were often large companies in the industry. Their main business might be different but it was normal for them to have a compet.i.tive relations.h.i.+p.
After signing the anti-compet.i.tion agreement, employees were restricted. Thus, the company had to provide a certain amount of compensation: employees had to continue paying monthly after leaving. Normally, more than 30% of the original income would be paid. It could be seen as the “hush money” and “compensation fee” that followed the compet.i.tion agreement.
If the company did not pay for a few months, the restrictions on employees by the compet.i.tion agreement would fail.
However, Dayak Corporation was a serious big company. These aspects must be very formal.
It would be a little troublesome if Eric really signed the anti-compet.i.tion agreement.
If he wanted to poach people, he had to pay a penalty. The situation of each company was different, but it would probably cost a few million yuan at least.
The key was that the System might not allow Pei Qian to spend the money to poach people.
Eric nodded. “There is an anti-compet.i.tion agreement.”
Pei Qian’s head was hurting.
What should he do?
Get Eric to talk to the upper echelons of Dayak Corporation and cancel this agreement?
Wouldn’t that be equivalent to telling others that I want to jump s.h.i.+p to a compet.i.tor’s company?
The upper echelons of Dayak Corporation were not stupid. How could they agree?
It was a little difficult.
Eric pondered for a moment and said, “However, if I really want to jump s.h.i.+p to Tengda, the anti-compet.i.tion agreement might not be able to restrict me.”
Pei Qian: “?”
At that moment, he could not think of a background for someone to say something like that.
Why, could it be that the European judge was a relative of yours?
Eric knew that Boss Pei must have misunderstood seeing Boss Pei’s slightly stunned expression. He quickly explained, “Of course, I cannot violate the contents of the compet.i.tion agreement. However, if I want to jump s.h.i.+p to Tengda, I will not be limited by the anti-compet.i.tion agreement.”
“That’s because Tengda does not meet the conditions set in the compet.i.tion agreement.”
Pei Qian still did not understand.
Tengda’s GOG and Finger Games’ IOI were competing with each other. That was a solid fact, right?
In that case, Eric jumping s.h.i.+p to GOG as the person-in-charge of IOI would trigger the anti-compet.i.tion agreement, right?
Eric explained, “My situation is a little special.”
“Actually, there are anti-compet.i.tion agreements in both Dayak Corporation and in Finger Games.”
“The anti-compet.i.tion agreement with Finger Games stated that the senior management and core designers are not allowed to join any other games company for the next two years after leaving. Naturally, that includes Tengda.”
“However, I’m not considered an employee of Finger Games, so I did not sign this anti-compet.i.tion agreement with Finger Games.”
“As for Dayak Corporation’s anti-compet.i.tion agreement, the situation is different from Finger Games’.”
“Dayak Corporation’s main business is in water, transport, energy, media, and so on. It might have bought some gaming companies but it’s not considered a main business at all.”
“What’s more, my original department was the media department. Therefore, my anti-compet.i.tion agreement mainly prohibits me from joining other media companies in Europe and America, as well as companies like water, transport, and energy that form a direct compet.i.tiveness with Dayak Corporation.”
“In addition, we are also restricted from joining some more famous internet companies internationally, such as the large companies in Silicon Valley.”
“This range is very wide, Tengda is indeed not among them…”
Pei Qian was stunned.
It could even be done this way?
He thought about it carefully. It seemed like he was really unaffected!
In fact, previously there were also some senior executives in the country who jumped s.h.i.+p between various large companies. Those who signed the anti-compet.i.tion agreement basically could not escape. They were sued successfully.
After all, it was obvious at a glance whether the two companies were competing or not.
However, Eric’s situation was obviously very special.
He was not originally in the game industry. Instead, he was in charge of some matters at Dayak Corporation’s media company.
Dayak Corporation wanted to strengthen their control of Finger Games and also to better expand IOI’s domestic server business after acquiring Finger Games. That was why they sent Eric to be the person-in-charge.
Eric might be in charge of the game business first but it was not in his anti-compet.i.tion agreement.
It was just like a company that developed cell phones. They would not make it clear in the anti-compet.i.tion agreement that they were not to be designers of a games company, nor would they make it clear that they were not to wash dishes and be waiters in restaurants.
That was because even if other executives wanted to jump s.h.i.+p, they had to jump s.h.i.+p to such businesses.
The so-called compet.i.tion agreement was to hope that employees would not jump into the same industry to become compet.i.tors with themselves. It was also to prevent large companies from maliciously poaching each other and spoiling the employment environment.
Wouldn’t he be acting like a hooligan if he were to change industries and not let them work? The law would not support him at all.
However, Eric had crossed industries because of his business expansion. This caused the content constrained by the original anti-compet.i.tion agreement to be ineffective…
Of course, this agreement had named many large companies and had them in all fields, but Tengda was not included.
That was because Tengda was a Chinese company. What’s more, it had only truly risen in the past two or three years. Dayak Corporation had never even heard of it before. How could they have predicted Tengda’s name and put it in the compet.i.tion agreement?
Pei Qian had not expected this to happen.
What’s more, he suddenly realized that both Eric and him were seriously discussing the possibility of jumping s.h.i.+p…
That made Eric fall silent as well. He felt that something was amiss with the topic.
Perhaps Boss Pei’s thirst for talents was beyond his words, causing Eric to be infected subconsciously.
Pei Qian suddenly raised his voice. “That’ll be easy!”
“Brother Eric, when can you start work? It shouldn’t take you long to go back and settle your resignation, right?”
Eric was a little shocked. There was no need to be so anxious, right?
Boss Pei was really unrestrained. He did not have the airs of a leader at all.
However, wasn’t that precisely where Boss Pei’s charm lay?
Eric pondered for a moment and said, “Boss Pei, this is too sudden. I’m not mentally prepared. I have to think about it.”
“What’s more… If I were to really want to join Tengda, I have a small request.”
“Can we poach Boss Zhao from Long Yu Corporation as well?”
“I have a tacit understanding with him. I hope we can continue working together.”
“Of course, forget it if you think he’s not capable enough, Boss Pei. What’s more, Boss Zhao probably really has the anti-compet.i.tion agreement on his back. This matter might not be easy to deal with.”
Pei Qian nodded immediately. “Sure! No problem!”
Pei Qian had an impression of Zhao Xuming.
He did not seem to have much ability. The only outstanding ability was that he did not like to take the blame.
If such a person could continue to combine with Eric, wouldn’t the chances of losing money increase greatly?
At that time, Eric would be in charge of the overseas market and Zhao Xuming would be in charge of the domestic market. They would work together!
Of course, Pei Qian did not know how to solve the problem if Zhao Xuming really had an anti-compet.i.tion agreement.
He could only think of a way to see if he could reach some kind of cooperation with Long Yu Corporation and exchange for Zhao Xuming.
If it really did not work, then forget it. He could only say that it was not fated.
It would not be perfect if there was only one Eric, but it should be enough.