Hogue & Belong has filed a California class action law suit against HP, Inc. on behalf of anyone who has been the victim of HP’s unlawful age discrimination practices and “no poach” arrangement with 3D Systems, Inc. within the last four years.
HP, Inc. has long established itself as a company on the leading edge of innovation. In HP’s desire to, in its own words “invent, and to reinvent,” this suit alleges that HP systematically terminated its older, higher paid employees and replaced them with younger, lower paid employees.
According to the Complaint, in 2013 HP’s then CEO, Meg Whitman explained that HP was aggressively seeking to replace older employees with younger employees. On the topic, some of Whitman’s comments include, but are not limited to:
“We need to return to a labor pyramid that really looks like a triangle where you have a lot of early career people who bring a lot of knowledge who you’re training to move up through your organization, and then people fall out either from a performance perspective or whatever.”
“And over the years, our labor pyramid [. . .] [has] become a bit more of a diamond. And we are working very hard to recalibrate and reshape our labor pyramid so it looks like the more classical pyramid that you should have in a company and particularly in ES. IF you don’t have a whole host of young people who are learning how to do delivery or learning how to do these kinds of things, you will be in real challenges.”
“It also helps us from a cost perspective [. . .] if your labor pyramid isn’t the right shape, you’re carrying a lot of extra cost. The truth is we’re still carrying a fair amount of extra costs around this company because the overall labor pyramid doesn’t look the way it should.”
HP is also alleged to have ensured its current or former employees could not work for one of its major competitors in its printer business by entering into a “no poach” agreement with 3D Systems, Inc., whereby both companies would secretly agree not to hire the other companies’ employees. The complaint alleges this type of agreement is unlawful to both HP and 3D System employees because it limits competition and artificially suppresses workers’ wages.
Read the full Complaint here. [Link to Complaint]
As the lawyers who have filed this class action, we invite former HP employees to come forward and share their stories of age discrimination and unfair competition with us. Many have already done so, and we are working to help help them recover and obtain restitution. The more people who come forward, the more leverage workers will have to recoup everyone’s losses. We also encourage former 3D Systems’ employees to come forward if you know or suspect that you were impacted by HP and 3D Systems’ “no poach” agreement.
If you are a former HP employee impacted by HP’s Workforce Reduction Plan or a former HP or 3D Systems and believe that you have been impacted by their secret “no poach” agreement, we want to hear from you. Please call (619) 238-4720. There is no cost or obligation.