Red Bull fights departure of aero chief Dan Fallows

[f1jcw]

This will be a very interesting case with Brexit in mind. For the past few decades there were European laws in place that prohibited these kids of very long periods that you can't work for a competitor. I myself had a few of those contracts, stating that "you can't work in the same field for a year, etc etc" but those normally never hold up in court (and no former employer ever held me to them).

So, when this is ramping up, expect it to make the UK/European news, the UK government and courts have to make the rules on this as they go...

At the moment there is not much difference between uk and eu law, majority was copied over as was impossible to rewrite them all for brexit deadline

[Jolle]

This will be a very interesting case with Brexit in mind. For the past few decades there were European laws in place that prohibited these kids of very long periods that you can't work for a competitor. I myself had a few of those contracts, stating that "you can't work in the same field for a year, etc etc" but those normally never hold up in court (and no former employer ever held me to them).

So, when this is ramping up, expect it to make the UK/European news, the UK government and courts have to make the rules on this as they go...

At the moment there is not much difference between uk and eu law, majority was copied over as was impossible to rewrite them all for brexit deadline

yes I know, but that means, with his case, the court basically will set a precedent now how British law will be explained from now on in these cases.

[west52keep64]

yes I know, but that means, with his case, the court basically will set a precedent now how British law will be explained from now on in these cases.

Yup, if the court ordered an injunction that prevented him from working for another F1 team until July 2023 that would certainly be precedent setting. That's why I honestly can't see that happening. The maximum length I can see them going for is 6 months, but Red Bull will have to make a very strong case for it because any such injunction is effectively preventing him from earning an income for that period of time, which probably isn't fair or reasonable. He could potentially work outside of F1 during that period as others have suggested, but he may argue that could be damaging to his career in F1.

[AngusF1]

Here's the guy's LinkedIn page: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dan-fallows-23937124/

Without getting into the legal or contractual aspects, the guy is an F1 aero engineer through and through. He started out at Lola, then Jaguar, then Dallara then to Red Bull. His whole career is in race car aerodynamics.

So, being canned from the F1 team and being required to work on road cars would be a complete change in industry and counter to his career path. If he wasn't interested in doing that, from a pragmatic or 'moral' perspective it's highly dubious for Red Bull to try to prevent him going elsewhere. He's an F1 engineer, he signed up for an F1 engineering role, the company then prohibited him from working on F1 internally, and is now going to court to prohibit him from working on F1 full stop until mid 2023. What?

[f1jcw]

Here's the guy's LinkedIn page: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dan-fallows-23937124/

Without getting into the legal or contractual aspects, the guy is an F1 aero engineer through and through. He started out at Lola, then Jaguar, then Dallara then to Red Bull. His whole career is in race car aerodynamics.

So, being canned from the F1 team and being required to work on road cars would be a complete change in industry and counter to his career path. If he wasn't interested in doing that, from a pragmatic or 'moral' perspective it's highly dubious for Red Bull to try to prevent him going elsewhere. He's an F1 engineer, he signed up for an F1 engineering role, the company then prohibited him from working on F1 internally, and is now going to court to prohibit him from working on F1 full stop until mid 2023. What?

Most of these type of contracts are not enforceable, I think if they’d have set a reasonable gardening leave, the courts would uphold it, but setting something like June 2023, they’ve pushed it to far

[adrianjordan]

yes I know, but that means, with his case, the court basically will set a precedent now how British law will be explained from now on in these cases.

Yup, if the court ordered an injunction that prevented him from working for another F1 team until July 2023 that would certainly be precedent setting. That's why I honestly can't see that happening. The maximum length I can see them going for is 6 months, but Red Bull will have to make a very strong case for it because any such injunction is effectively preventing him from earning an income for that period of time, which probably isn't fair or reasonable. He could potentially work outside of F1 during that period as others have suggested, but he may argue that could be damaging to his career in F1.

He already has a job waiting at Aston Martin. Not sure how he'd argue it could damage his career.

[Juzh]

yes I know, but that means, with his case, the court basically will set a precedent now how British law will be explained from now on in these cases.

Yup, if the court ordered an injunction that prevented him from working for another F1 team until July 2023 that would certainly be precedent setting. That's why I honestly can't see that happening. The maximum length I can see them going for is 6 months, but Red Bull will have to make a very strong case for it because any such injunction is effectively preventing him from earning an income for that period of time, which probably isn't fair or reasonable. He could potentially work outside of F1 during that period as others have suggested, but he may argue that could be damaging to his career in F1.

Why would non-compete clauses even exist in contracts if they're not enforceable anyway? If red bull hadn't gone on offensive this guy would be able to transfer latest developments to a rival team only a few months after deciding he's had enough basically just by memorising everything for this very short period of time, he wouldn't even need any usb sticks or cloud storage or paper trail. At minimum an injunction should include 6 months that was agreed to be served anyway after 2022 if he decided not to extend.

If there's by some miracle no injunction at all, then another precedent will be set, anyone can cross over at a whim and without fear of consequences at all (at least from a uk to another uk based team).

[dans79]

Why would non-compete clauses even exist in contracts if they're not enforceable anyway?

They and gardening leave are generally used for when the employee quits, or gets fired in a straightforward fashion. However the waters get muddied when the company starts playing around, by altering the employees job or the catchall I have seen, creating a hostile work environment.


Here is a quick little article from a law firm broadly covering the topic here in the states.
https://www.ballmanfirm.com/non-compete ... -make.html

[Zynerji]

I think all gardening leave should be served in the FOM.

That way all of the freshest loopholes could be closed or shared, and the the teams would learn to just release engineers to avoid the snitching.

Win/win!

[ME4ME]

Didn't Fallows sign for Mclaren a few years ago, only to change his mind and eventually stayed put at Red Bull?

Can't help but feel that if Fallows had a contract with an earliest termination date of dec31 2022 and a known 6-month non-compete clause, he should blame himself for the trouble. It was naive for him to believe that Red Bull would keep him in the loop untill december 31. At best, Red Bull would've send him home, paid his salary till the end of the year, after which he'd be without an F1 job for half a year.

When you sign a highly ranked well paid job contract it should come as no surpise that there are some strings attached.

[west52keep64]

yes I know, but that means, with his case, the court basically will set a precedent now how British law will be explained from now on in these cases.

Yup, if the court ordered an injunction that prevented him from working for another F1 team until July 2023 that would certainly be precedent setting. That's why I honestly can't see that happening. The maximum length I can see them going for is 6 months, but Red Bull will have to make a very strong case for it because any such injunction is effectively preventing him from earning an income for that period of time, which probably isn't fair or reasonable. He could potentially work outside of F1 during that period as others have suggested, but he may argue that could be damaging to his career in F1.

He already has a job waiting at Aston Martin. Not sure how he'd argue it could damage his career.

Time out of the industry, also AM might not wait until July 2023. He could argue when he's allowed to work in F1 again in 2023 teams might be less likely to offer him work because he doesn't have recent experience.

I'm not saying I agree with any of this by the way, just that these are arguments an individual could make.

[west52keep64]

When you sign a highly ranked well paid job contract it should come as no surpise that there are some strings attached.

Yes correct, but it seems the argument is that he was no longer doing that highly ranked job when he quit.

[Big Tea]

I think all gardening leave should be served in the FOM.

That way all of the freshest loopholes could be closed or shared, and the the teams would learn to just release engineers to avoid the snitching.

Win/win!

That is quite a good idea. Even if some time is spent with the stewards and director to pass informal information both ways it would be valuable.

It does not even have to be in the F1 section. For instance Bob Fernley is chairman of the FIA Single-Seater Commission which covers all race cars in all formulas so there would be nothing taboo concerning the team they leave or go to.
There are always 'working groups' studding things that could be used too. Useful for both FIA and the person concerned.

I would like to see them pursue this

(Erm, cant give you an upvote sorry)

[mclaren111]

Didn't Fallows sign for Mclaren a few years ago, only to change his mind and eventually stayed put at Red Bull?

Can't help but feel that if Fallows had a contract with an earliest termination date of dec31 2022 and a known 6-month non-compete clause, he should blame himself for the trouble. It was naive for him to believe that Red Bull would keep him in the loop untill december 31. At best, Red Bull would've send him home, paid his salary till the end of the year, after which he'd be without an F1 job for half a year.

When you sign a highly ranked well paid job contract it should come as no surpise that there are some strings attached.

Amen...

[diffuser]

Pretty interesting to read about you guys chatting about this but it sounds to me as if we don't know what is in the contract. The contract will be written either more favourable for employer or the employee depending on who had more torque at the time of the negotiations. Being that RBR was trying to keep Fallows from escaping to McLaren at the time, who knows what's in that contract.