8. Intellectual Property.
8.1 If Employee creates, invents, designs, develops, contributes to or improves any works of authorship, inventions, intellectual property, materials, documents or other work product (including, without limitation, research, reports, software, databases, systems, applications, presentations, textual works, content or audiovisual materials) (“Works”), either alone or with third parties, at any time during Employee’s employment by the Employer Group and within the scope of such employment and/or with the use of any of the Employer Group’s resources (“Employer Works”), Employee hereby irrevocably assigns, transfers and conveys, to the maximum extent permitted by applicable law, all rights and intellectual property rights therein (including rights under patent, industrial property, copyright, trademark, trade secret, unfair competition and related laws) to Employer to the extent ownership of any such rights does not vest originally in Employer.
8.2 Employee shall take all requested actions and execute all necessary documents (including any licenses or assignments) at Employer’s expense (but without further remuneration) to assist Employer in validating, maintaining, protecting, enforcing, perfecting, recording, patenting or registering any of Employer’s rights in Employer Works. If Employer is unable for any other reason to secure Employee’s signature on any document for this purpose, then Employee hereby irrevocably designates and appoints Employer and its duly authorized officers and agents as Employee’s agent and attorney in fact, to act for and in Employee’s behalf and stead to execute any documents and to do all other lawfully permitted acts in connection with the foregoing.
8.3 Employee shall not knowingly improperly use for the benefit of, bring to any premises of, divulge, disclose, communicate, reveal, transfer or provide access to, or share with any member of the Employer Group any confidential, proprietary or non-public information or intellectual property relating to a former employer or other third party without the prior written permission of such third party. Employee shall comply with all relevant policies and guidelines of Employer, including, without limitation, policies and guidelines regarding the protection of confidential information and intellectual property and potential conflicts of interest. Employee acknowledges that Employer may amend any such policies and guidelines from time to time, and that Employee remains at all times bound by their most current version.
8.4 Notwithstanding anything to the contrary contained herein, pursuant to the Defend Trade Secrets Act of 2016, Employee shall not be held criminally or civilly liable under any Federal or State trade secret law for the disclosure of a trade secret that: (A) is made (i) in confidence to a Federal, state, or local government official, either directly or indirectly, or to an attorney; and (ii) solely for the purpose of reporting or investigating a suspected violation of law; or (B) is made in a complaint or other document filed in a lawsuit or other proceeding, if such filing is made under seal. Employee also understands that if he files a lawsuit for retaliation by the Employer Group for reporting a suspected violation of law, Employee may disclose the trade secret to his attorney and use the trade secret information in the court proceeding, if Employee (i) files any document containing the trade secret under seal, and (ii) does not disclose the trade secret, except pursuant to court order.
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