Sideman & Bancroft

Firm overview:

Founded by former federal prosecutors in the late 1970s, Sideman & Bancroft is a boutique firm with offices in San Francisco, New York and Paris. It is led by ex-Salans lawyer Beatrice Martinet, with 40 attorneys across 12 niche practice areas.

Sideman & Bancroft’s Trade Secrets and Confidentiality group assists clients in protecting trade secrets and other technologies, production processes, business and marketing plans, and customer list confidential information.

The group’s advisory work includes assisting clients to design, negotiate and enforce non-disclosure and non-solicitation agreements, including agreements with employees, to protect companies’ confidential information. The group helps clients to implement these elements as trade secrets protection plans. Sideman & Bancroft also advises clients on their rights and obligations when receiving confidential information from others.

Team overview:

Sideman & Bancroft’s Trade Secrets and Confidentiality group has three partners and one associate based in the San Francisco office that are active in the practice area. White collar criminal defence and complex commercial litigation partner Ellen Leonida joined the firm in June 2024.

Key matters:

• Trilobio v Keoni Gandall and Nanala, Case No. 4:24-cv-06337-JST, US District Court, Northern District of California

In October 2024, Sideman & Bateman attorneys Ronald Fisher and Ellen Leonida represented biotech startup Trilobio in a significant trade secrets victory.

Trilobio won an injunction against former CEO Keoni Gandall and his company, Nanala in a California district court. Judge Jon Tigar found that Gandall had stolen trade secrets, in the form of source code, from Trilobio. Gandall was ordered to cease and desist all activity related to the stolen intellectual property.

According to Trilobio’s motion, the source code stolen by Gandall was the foundation of Trilobio’s proprietary technology, which exponentially decreases the cost of creating long sequences of DNA for medical and genetic research. Gandall and Nanala were also enjoined from using any other Trilobio intellectual property, including Trilobio’s robotic artificial intelligence technology for conducting genetic experiments and testing.

According to Trilobio’s motion, this technology marries hardware and AI software that creates “bio-robots fitted with sensors enabling them to monitor and modify their behaviour as they conduct genetic testing,” including by “us[ing] AI to improve their performance, learn from their mistakes, and diagnose errors in testing processes that would otherwise be undiscovered.”

Trolobio co-founder Roya Amini-Naieni commented: “We are pleased the court took immediate action to protect Trilobio's trade secrets. Trilobio takes Mr. Gandall’s theft very seriously and will always defend its intellectual property vigorously.”

Clients:

Trilobio