The previous model for this start-up I am working at just went belly up and now they are considering pivoting towards something I am working on designing in my spare time. How does this affect the non-compete and non-disclosure stuff I signed with this company previously?
How drastic was this pivot? I'm not a lawyer, but I suspect your position is going to look worse the less the company had to pivot to "scoop" this idea. Regardless of how close they were to your hobby before the switch, I think that if you haven't made your hobby known already you need to do so now. After all, your hobby experience might pay off in a big way if they know about it, and there doesn't seem to be much down side to telling them in the interest of not violating a non-compete.
They were a news aggregator before, and now they want to get into blogging with the same model I was designing in my spare. So, in other words, a completely different market.
I read that as the management didn't think of you highly enough, or that they don't think you could pull it off or that what you did is significant enough. They may also have no incentive to dilute their shares for a workable solution by their existing employees (NIH?). Anyway to look at it, it is bad.
In other comments others mentioned non-compete. At least in California non-compete is pretty much unenforcible, but IP right protection is. During your employment they do have IP rights to inventions you made unless (a) they are not in the same field or (b) you have disclosed it as prior invention per a typical employment agreement. Now that since (a) no longer applies, you better make sure you notify them and file a formal amendment to your employment agreement that whatever you worked on is considered prior invention. Or else from now on they may claim the right to not just what you're about to do, but also the hard work you've done. This is serious stuff. People and companies had been destroyed by like this. Either way, I think you can no longer continue your moonlight path on this very subject under their employment (unless you get them to put an exception clause to your employment contract, but I doubt they'll entertain that). I hope you work out something with them so they use your stuff and reward you.
Don't they have to build all of it from scratch cause the pivot is in completely different direction? I am assuming you have made lots of progress over the days and really don't see why they would not want to offer you a good deal and include your work. Might wanna try to talk thoroughly with the founder/CEO.
In Cambridge Engineering, Inc. v. Mercury Partners they found that the non-compete clause was so broad as to keep the employee from finding reasonable work, so it was thrown out. In this case, you signed the non-compete agreement while your company was performing A, now they want to perform B which is something you do on the side. My guess would be that in order to enforce B they would need you to sign a whole new NCA. I would check with a lawyer though.
