Current round of legal wrangling between Ubisoft and EA decided in Ubi's favor. Quebec court upholds restraining order preventing former staff from working at EA.
According to the Quebecois newspaper Le Devoir, Ubisoft has won the current round in a legal battle that pits the publisher of the popular Splinter Cell game franchise against U.S.-based powerhouse Electronic Arts. The Quebec Court of Appeals upheld Ubisoft's temporary restraining order which sought to prevent four former Ubisoft employees hired by Electronic Arts Montreal from working while a larger case is litigated. That larger case accuses the four former Splinter Cell developers with violating non-compete clauses allegedly signed when they first took up employment at Ubi.
The non-compete clause prevents employees who leave the company from working for any other computer game concern. Specifically, the non-compete clause prevents former Ubisoft employees from working in the North American game industry for a period of one year after leaving the company. Ubisoft Divertissements, the company's Canadian subsidiary, had sought an injunction to prevent Splinter Cell developers Steve Dupont, Hugo Dallaire, Marc Bouchard, and François Champagne-Pelland from actually working at Electronic Arts' Montreal office.
News source: GameSpot
According to the Quebecois newspaper Le Devoir, Ubisoft has won the current round in a legal battle that pits the publisher of the popular Splinter Cell game franchise against U.S.-based powerhouse Electronic Arts. The Quebec Court of Appeals upheld Ubisoft's temporary restraining order which sought to prevent four former Ubisoft employees hired by Electronic Arts Montreal from working while a larger case is litigated. That larger case accuses the four former Splinter Cell developers with violating non-compete clauses allegedly signed when they first took up employment at Ubi.
The non-compete clause prevents employees who leave the company from working for any other computer game concern. Specifically, the non-compete clause prevents former Ubisoft employees from working in the North American game industry for a period of one year after leaving the company. Ubisoft Divertissements, the company's Canadian subsidiary, had sought an injunction to prevent Splinter Cell developers Steve Dupont, Hugo Dallaire, Marc Bouchard, and François Champagne-Pelland from actually working at Electronic Arts' Montreal office.
News source: GameSpot
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Non-compete agreements should be illegal - but while they exist people are forced to be slaves of their "masters" the corporate boss.
I think not and that is very unfair.
On top of that I would assume that that would still apply even if they were layed off.
It just sux for the lowman on the totem pole.
I feel english people should boycot them. They won't hire you if you don't know french, even for a position of testing games. The main problem with that is although they are a french company, all their games they make are avaible in english and when you see screenshots, way before the games come out, you see english shots, so deductivly, they know english.
I dunno why they even have an english version of their jobs section if you HAVE to understand french to get a job. Why not just only have it in french and then if someone don't understand french they they can't read the job ad then wont apply.
Last edited by 1018 on 14 Oct 2003 - 00:06
It's due to the Quebec Societé pour la protection de la langue francaise (society for the protection of the french language) and also a Quebec law that forces all businesses to operate primarily in french. Even though their products might be of another language, the primarily used language in the work environment (documents, signs, etc...) must be french.
I know it sucks, I live in Quebec myself and even the federal government offices in my city must operate primarily in french.
As for the non-compete clause in there contracts, a few companies are doing that nowadays, I know I had one in my contract when I started working for Bell Sympatico ISP that prevented me from working for another canadian ISP for a period of one year after leaving Sympatico
I wouldn't have cared too much really but the have an english version of their jobs on their site, the beta tester position didnt mention any requirement of french (which in a couple other positions I applied to did) and my resume is in englsih and the 1 page sample report I wrote was in english. If they didn't call me, it'd be fine, but it really sucks after having no indications of needing french for a job and spending a few hours typing out something good, then waiting for a call. Finally get the call and when I don't understand what hes saying in french he denies me even an interview.
I don't see how someone who can't understand french can get a job here. I've been out of school since last december and am still unemployed because everywhere they want french. I might apply for disability if I don't get a job soon, since by not having french prevents me from working, its a disability.
I was surprised where I went to their offices one, they are located in some old crappy run down looking buliding, if you ever just happened to walk by the place you'd never thing that a big or even small video game company is in there.
But on the topic of those contracts hehe, I believe a little while in ontario there was a law that made those kind of contract agrrements illegal or something, don't remember correctly tho or all the details of it but I am sure there was something abou that a little while ago.
According to the Quebecois newspaper Le Devoir,
Holy flying crap batman! I never tought i'd see that newspaper mentionnent on Neowin o.o
When will La Presse be, I wonder...
How can you find another job if you aren't allowed to work in the same industry for a year after you stop working for a company? That makes you 'out of date' for the programming industry in a lot of instances.
Unless they are going to provide compensation for that year to their employees, I don't see how they can expect someone to not work for a year...
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