Life Spine, Inc. v. Aegis Spine, Inc.

In the

United States Court of Appeals

For the Seventh Circuit

____________________

No. 21‐1649

LIFE SPINE, INC.,

Plaintiff‐Appellee,

v.

AEGIS SPINE, INC.,

Defendant‐Appellant.

____________________

Appeal from the United States District Court for the

Northern District of Illinois, Eastern Division.

No. 19‐cv‐7092 — Young B. Kim, Magistrate Judge.

____________________

ARGUED JULY 21, 2021 — DECIDED AUGUST 9, 2021

____________________

Before SCUDDER, ST. EVE, and KIRSCH, Circuit Judges.

ST. EVE, Circuit Judge. This trade secret case arises from a

short‐lived business relationship between two companies that

sell spinal implant devices. Life Spine, Inc. makes and sells a

spinal implant device called the ProLift Expandable Spacer

System. Aegis Spine, Inc. contracted with Life Spine to distrib‐

ute the ProLift to hospitals and surgeons. In the distribution

agreement, Aegis promised to protect Life Spine’s confiden‐

tial information, act as a fiduciary for Life Spine’s property,

2 No. 21‐1649

and refrain from reverse engineering the ProLift. Despite

these promises, Aegis funneled information about the ProLift

to its parent company, L&K Biomed, Inc., to help L&K de‐

velop a competing spinal implant device. Shortly after L&K’s

competing product hit the market, Life Spine sued Aegis for

trade secret misappropriation and breach of the distribution

agreement. Following a nine‐day evidentiary hearing, the dis‐

trict court granted Life Spine’s motion for a preliminary in‐

junction barring Aegis and its business partners from market‐

ing the competing product.

Aegis now appeals. It submits that the district court’s in‐

junction rests on a flawed legal conclusion—namely, that a

company can have trade secret protection in a device that it

publicly discloses through patents, displays, and sales. We see

the issue differently, however. As a legal matter, we do not

dispute—nor does Life Spine—that information in the public

domain cannot be a trade secret. But the issue here is factual:

Did Life Spine publicly disclose the specific information that

it seeks to protect by patenting, displaying, and selling the

ProLift? The district court found that the answer was no, and

Aegis must show that its finding was clear error. It has not

done so. Finding no basis to upset the district court’s meticu‐

lous analysis, we affirm.

I. Background

A. Factual Background

Plaintiff Life Spine is an Illinois company that makes and

sells surgically implanted medical devices that treat spine dis‐

orders. Its best‐selling device is the ProLift—an expandable

spinal implant that treats degenerative disc disease. The Pro‐

Lift consists of an implant, or “cage,” and an installer. The

No. 21‐1649 3

cage has five main components, shown in the drawing below:

an upper endplate, a lower endplate, a nose ramp, a base

ramp, and an expansion screw. Dovetail‐shaped grooves con‐

nect the different components. The installer is used to insert

the cage into a patient’s spine and expand it to restore spinal

disc height.

ProLift cage (exploded)

Expandable cages are intricate devices with many small

component parts. Precise engineering is necessary to ensure

that they can withstand decades of intense spinal pressure.

Life Spine spent more than three years designing and devel‐

oping the ProLift. To do so, it studied publicly available infor‐

mation about other expandable cages, including patents, and

went through an exhaustive trial‐and‐error process. During

the trial‐and‐error process, Life Spine repeatedly redesigned

the device, sometimes by adjusting the size of its components

by fractions of a millimeter. In March 2016, the FDA approved

Life Spine’s application to market the ProLift. In October

2017, Life Spine obtained a patent for the ProLift. Life Spine’s

4 No. 21‐1649

patent includes various drawings and figures (including the

drawing above), along with descriptions of the components

and their interaction.

Life Spine considers “the precise dimensions and meas‐

urements of the ProLift components and subcomponents and

their interconnectivity” to be confidential trade secrets. A key

fact in dispute is whether third parties can access those pre‐

cise specifications without first signing confidentiality agree‐

ments. The district court found that the answer was no: Third

parties can only learn such information if they have unfet‐

tered access to the device and specialized measuring equip‐

ment, and Life Spine does not allow third parties such access

unless they first sign confidentiality agreements. The precise

specifications of the ProLift are not available from marketing

materials, which include only “rounded approximations” of

the components. Nor are they available from patent materials,

which disclose the components and their interaction but not

their precise measurements or dimensions. Life Spine dis‐

plays the ProLift at industry conventions, but it supervises an‐

yone who handles the device. And while Life Spine sells the

ProLift to hospitals and surgeons, it is not available for the

public to purchase. Rather, Life Spine (through its distribu‐

tors) sells the device to hospitals and surgeons, who purchase

the device for use in scheduled surgeries. Moreover, Life

Spine requires its distributors to oversee each ProLift device

that they sell up until surgery.

Defendant Aegis is a Colorado company that sells medical

devices to treat spinal conditions. Aegis does not make medi‐

cal devices, but its parent company, L&K, does. Based in

South Korea, L&K is the majority owner of Aegis and a direct

competitor of Life Spine. Aegis and L&K have a close

No. 21‐1649 5

relationship; Aegis supplies information to L&K upon re‐

quest, and several of the companies’ top managers have

worked at both companies. Around April 2016, L&K and Ae‐

gis decided that, to remain competitive in the United States

market, L&K should design and develop an expandable cage

product.

In October 2017—while Aegis and L&K were still plan‐

ning the launch of a new expandable cage product—Aegis

contacted Life Spine about serving as a distributor of the Pro‐

Lift. In connection with this proposal, Aegis asked Life Spine

for a ProLift device, explaining that certain customers wanted

to see it for demonstration purposes. Life Spine agreed, but

first required Aegis to promise in writing that it would protect

Life Spine’s confidential information, use the confidential in‐

formation only in furtherance of the parties’ business relation‐

ship, and refrain from sharing the ProLift with anyone who

intended to use it for purposes of reverse engineering, copy‐

ing, or otherwise competing with Life Spine. After making

these promises, Aegis showed the ProLift device to a surgeon

and asked the surgeon to help it and L&K develop a compet‐

ing expandable cage. The surgeon agreed.

In January 2018, Life Spine and Aegis signed a formal dis‐

tribution agreement. The agreement (which superseded ear‐

lier agreements) allowed Aegis to solicit sales of the ProLift

from a list of surgeons, including two surgeons who had

agreed to help L&K develop a competing expandable cage. In

return, Aegis promised to act as a fiduciary for Life Spine’s

property. Aegis also promised not to copy, reverse engineer,

or create derivative products based on the ProLift. The agree‐

ment contained confidentiality provisions barring Aegis from

sharing Life Spine’s confidential information or using it for

6 No. 21‐1649

any non‐contractual purpose. It further required Aegis to

train its employees on complying with these provisions and

provided that the obligations would “survive the expiration”

of the agreement.

In March 2018, Aegis held a kickoff meeting for L&K’s

forthcoming expandable cage product, the AccelFix‐XT. Aegis

brought a ProLift set to the meeting, and its surgeon consult‐

ants examined it. The surgeon consultants continued to help

Aegis and L&K throughout the design process; they pur‐

chased and used the ProLift in surgeries and gave feedback to

Aegis and L&K on the device’s performance. Aegis and L&K

incorporated their feedback into the design process.

In May 2018, Aegis sent L&K a ProLift cage. A month later,

Aegis sent L&K a full ProLift set (cage and installer). L&K had

asked to see the devices to help develop the AccelFix‐XT. Ae‐

gis sent the devices to L&K without Life Spine’s knowledge

or consent. After receiving the installer, L&K told Aegis that

it was copying the basic design of the ProLift installer. Mate‐

rials from a meeting a few months later show that L&K de‐

signed the AccelFix‐XT installer to be compatible with the

ProLift cage.

The district court described the evidence surrounding

these device shipments as “murky.” L&K’s head of Research

and Development claimed that he never saw the cage that Ae‐

gis sent over in May 2018. As for the full ProLift set that Aegis

sent over in June, he testified that he decided not to open the

package because he did not want L&K to have to pay for it.

He maintained that L&K returned the unopened box to Aegis,

but he could not recall any details about returning it, nor was

there any other evidence to verify the return. Aegis eventually

told Life Spine that Aegis had received an empty box from

No. 21‐1649 7

Life Spine, without a cage in it. But Life Spine was skeptical;

it had never had such a problem in the past, and a photo of

the “empty box” showed that someone had affixed a second

antitampering sticker over the original one. Life Spine sus‐

pected that someone had opened the box, removed the cage,

and then tried to cover it up. The district court ultimately

agreed, concluding that L&K’s explanation to the contrary

was not credible.

The distribution agreement between Life Spine and Aegis

expired on August 31, 2018, but the parties chose to continue

their arrangement for the time being. In September 2018, Ae‐

gis and Life Spine orally agreed that the parties would con‐

tinue to operate under the terms of the distribution agreement

while they negotiated a new contract. Aegis continued to sub‐

mit purchase orders, and Life Spine continued to fill them.

Around the same time, Aegis asked Life Spine for a cus‐

tom installer to show its customers. In September 2018, Life

Spine sent Aegis an email with a picture and details about the

custom installer. Aegis forwarded the email to L&K, despite

knowing that Life Spine considered it confidential.

Life Spine never shared ProLift testing data with Aegis,

but Aegis somehow obtained it. The materials from an Octo‐

ber 2018 meeting between L&K and Aegis include a reference

to the results of a “static shear compression test” for the Pro‐

Lift. A static shear compression test measures how much load

a cage can withstand on a one‐time basis before breaking or

deforming. Life Spine considers the results of its static shear

compression testing to be confidential trade secrets. It submit‐

ted the results to the FDA when applying for approval to mar‐

ket the ProLift, but it did not otherwise disclose them. Because

the FDA approved the ProLift (and, by extension, its testing

8 No. 21‐1649

results), a competitor with access to ProLift testing results

would have a leg up in the trial‐and‐error process. Aegis

could not explain how it obtained the testing results. The dis‐

trict court found that “the most likely explanation is that L&K

used its access to the ProLift cage to conduct its own testing.”

In December 2018, development of the AccelFix‐XT was

going poorly, so L&K decided to start from scratch. Three

months later, in March 2019, L&K applied for FDA approval

to market the AccelFix‐XT. By FDA regulation, medical device

developers must keep “design history files” that reflect each

step in the design of a medical device. See 21 C.F.R. § 820.30(j).

But there is almost no documentation in the AccelFix‐XT de‐

sign history file from January 2019 through April 2019. Dur‐

ing that short period, as it happens, L&K redesigned the Ac‐

celFix‐XT to change a square component to a dovetail feature,

such that its key measurements were essentially identical to

the ProLift’s dovetail feature. The design history file does not

reflect the process behind that redesign. The FDA approved

the AccelFix‐XT in September 2019.

Meanwhile, the parties’ distribution relationship had

ended. In December 2018, Aegis directly purchased 45 ProLift

cages from Life Spine. Attempts to formally renew the rela‐

tionship, however, were unsuccessful. In the spring and sum‐

mer of 2019, Aegis and Life Spine attempted to negotiate a

new agreement. In July 2019, however, Aegis backed out of

negotiations. In September 2019, Life Spine first learned that

Aegis and L&K were launching the AccelFix‐XT in direct

competition with the ProLift.

No. 21‐1649 9

B. Procedural Background

Shortly after learning of the AccelFix‐XT, Life Spine sued

Aegis for breaching the distribution agreement and misap‐

propriating its trade secrets in violation of the Defend Trade

Secrets Act, 18 U.S.C. § 1836 et seq., and the Illinois Trade Se‐

crets Act, 765 ILCS 1065/1 et seq. The parties consented to Mag‐

istrate Judge Kim’s jurisdiction. See 28 U.S.C. § 636(c).

In August 2020, Life Spine moved for a preliminary injunc‐

tion. The district court held a nine‐day hearing on the motion.

Representatives from both sides testified, as did John Ashley,

a seasoned medical device developer whom Life Spine called

as an expert witness. Ashley testified that the ProLift cage and

the AccelFix‐XT cage are “essentially the same.” Both devices

have the same five essential components—two endplates, a

nose ramp, a base ramp, and an expansion screw—which

function together in substantially the same way. In both de‐

vices, the endplates and ramps connect via dovetail‐shaped

grooves and a screw that controls the cage’s expansion. The

dovetails’ specifications vary by mere fractions of a millime‐

ter. Remarkably, the ProLift installer is compatible with the

AccelFix‐XT cage, which Ashley found “shocking” and un‐

precedented in his experience. Even Aegis’s CEO conceded

that it would be “impossible” to produce a cage compatible

with another company’s installer without knowing the speci‐

fications of the other company’s cage.

Ashley was surprised at how fast L&K developed the Ac‐

celFix‐XT after starting from scratch in December 2018. He

testified that 18 months is a reasonable timeframe for devel‐

oping an expandable cage, and that the three‐month period

for L&K was much shorter than he would have expected. He

also commented on the lack of documentation in the design

10 No. 21‐1649

history file. After reviewing 20 different expandable cage de‐

vices, Ashley concluded that the ProLift and AccelFix‐XT

were the only two devices that were “essentially the same.”

This led him to conclude that the AccelFix‐XT was a “deriva‐

tive product” based on the ProLift cage. In his opinion, L&K

used either the ProLift cage itself or detailed information

about the ProLift to develop the AccelFix‐XT.

After hearing the evidence, the district court granted Life

Spine’s motion for a preliminary injunction. It set forth its rea‐

soning in a 65‐page order that comprehensively analyzed the

facts and legal arguments. On the merits, the court found that

Life Spine had a strong likelihood of success on its trade secret

misappropriation claim and its breach of contract claims. Spe‐

cifically, Life Spine made a strong showing that Aegis had

misappropriated three distinct trade secrets: “(1) the combi‐

nation, dimensions, and interconnectivity of the ProLift’s

components and subcomponents; (2) static shear compression

testing data; and (3) information about how Life Spine prices

the ProLift.” As for the breach of contract claim, Life Spine

made a strong showing that Aegis had breached the confiden‐

tiality, fiduciary duty, and anticopying provisions of the dis‐

tribution agreement. The court also found, as a preliminary

matter, that each of these provisions survived the agreement’s

expiration. Moving to the other injunction factors, the court

found that Life Spine had suffered irreparable harm in the

form of lost customers and market share, damaged goodwill

and reputation, and price erosion. It found, too, that the harm

to Life Spine of denying an injunction outweighed the harm

to Aegis of granting one. Based on these findings, the district

court enjoined Aegis and its business partners from making,

marketing, distributing, selling, or obtaining intellectual

property rights in the AccelFix‐XT.

No. 21‐1649 11

Aegis filed an interlocutory appeal of the order granting

the preliminary injunction. See 28 U.S.C. § 1292(a)(1).

II. Discussion

To obtain a preliminary injunction, a plaintiff must show

that it is likely to succeed on the merits, and that traditional

legal remedies would be inadequate, such that it would suffer

irreparable harm without the injunction. Speech First, Inc. v.

Killeen, 968 F.3d 628, 637 (7th Cir. 2020). If the plaintiff makes

this showing, the court weighs the harm of denying an injunc‐

tion to the plaintiff against the harm to the defendant of grant‐

ing one. Id. This balancing test is done on a sliding scale: “If

the plaintiff is likely to win on the merits, the balance of harms

need not weigh as heavily in his favor.” Id. In balancing the

harms, the court also considers the public interest. Id.

We review a district court’s decision to grant or deny a

preliminary injunction for abuse of discretion. Id. at 638. In

doing so, we review the court’s legal conclusions de novo and

its factual findings for clear error. Id. Absent legal or factual

errors, we afford “great deference” to the court’s decision. Id.

(internal quotation and citation omitted).

A. Likelihood of Success on the Merits

Aegis’s appeal focuses primarily on Life Spine’s likelihood

of success on the merits. For present purposes, Aegis does not

dispute that L&K used the information that Aegis shared with

it to reverse engineer the ProLift. Instead, Aegis maintains

that none of the shared information was confidential. In Ae‐

gis’s view, the district court legally erred in finding that Life

Spine could have trade secret protection in information that it

publicly disclosed through patents, displays, and sales. Aegis

12 No. 21‐1649

maintains that this error permeated the court’s assessment of

the merits.

We recently clarified that “a plaintiff must demonstrate

that its claim has some likelihood of success on the merits, not

merely a better than negligible chance.” Mays v. Dart, 974 F.3d

810, 822 (7th Cir. 2020) (internal quotations and citations omit‐

ted). In other words, “a mere possibility of success is not

enough.” Ill. Republican Party v. Pritzker, 973 F.3d 760, 762 (7th

Cir. 2020). The precise showing necessary “depends on the

facts of the case at hand because of our sliding scale ap‐

proach.” Mays, 974 F.3d at 822.

1. Trade Secret Misappropriation

Life Spine brings parallel trade secret misappropriation

claims under federal and state law. Under federal law, infor‐

mation qualifies as a “trade secret” if (1) “the owner thereof

has taken reasonable measures to keep such information se‐

cret” and (2) “the information derives independent economic

value, actual or potential, from not being generally known to,

and not being readily ascertainable through proper means by,

another person who can obtain economic value from the dis‐

closure or use of the information.” 18 U.S.C. § 1839(3). Illi‐

nois’s definition is materially identical. 765 ILCS 1065/2(d).

Under both statutes, whether information qualifies as a trade

secret is a question of fact that “requires an ad hoc evaluation

of all the surrounding circumstances.” Learning Curve Toys,

Inc. v. PlayWood Toys, Inc., 342 F.3d 714, 723 (7th Cir. 2003).

Although the existence of a trade secret is a question of

fact, there are some general rules that guide the inquiry. Rel‐

evant here, “[i]nformation that is public knowledge or that is

generally known in an industry cannot be a trade secret.”

No. 21‐1649 13

Ruckelshaus v. Monsanto Co., 467 U.S. 986, 1002 (1984); accord

Pope v. Alberto‐Culver Co., 694 N.E.2d 615, 617 (Ill. App. Ct.

1998). Thus, a company may not publicly disclose information

in a patent and then claim that the information is a trade se‐

cret. “Publication in a patent destroys the trade secret.”

BondPro Corp. v. Siemens Power Generation, Inc., 463 F.3d 702,

706 (7th Cir. 2006). Similarly, a company may not publicly sell

or display a product and then claim trade secret protection in

information that is “readily ascertainable” upon examination

of the product. Restatement (Third) of Unfair Competition

§ 39 cmt. f (1995); accord Accent Packaging, Inc. v. Leggett & Platt,

Inc., 707 F.3d 1318, 1329 (Fed. Cir. 2013); Pope, 694 N.E.2d at

618; 1 Milgrim on Trade Secrets § 1.05 (2021).

Importantly, though, a limited disclosure does not destroy

all trade secret protection in a product. Rockwell Graphic Sys.,

Inc. v. DEV Indus., Inc., 925 F.2d 174, 176–77 (7th Cir. 1991).

Trade secret law focuses on the “concrete secrets” that the

plaintiff seeks to protect, rather than “broad areas of technol‐

ogy.” Composite Marine Propellers, Inc. v. Van Der Woude, 962

F.2d 1263, 1266 (7th Cir. 1992). Thus, a company can maintain

trade secret protection in the undisclosed aspects of a prod‐

uct, even if it has publicly disclosed other aspects of the same

product. See, e.g., Henry Hope X‐Ray Prods., Inc. v. Marron Car‐

rel, Inc., 674 F.2d 1336, 1342 (9th Cir. 1982) (patent drawings

did not destroy trade secret protection because they provided

“only a general depiction of a gearing system” and did not

disclose the precise information that the plaintiff sought to

protect); see also Wellogix, Inc. v. Accenture, L.L.P., 716 F.3d 867,

875 (5th Cir. 2013) (“[A] patent destroys the secrecy necessary

to maintain a trade secret only when the patent and the trade

secret both cover the same subject matter.”) (internal quota‐

tion and citation omitted). A trade secret can even exist “in a

14 No. 21‐1649

combination of characteristics and components, each of

which, by itself, is in the public domain,” so long as their

“unique combination” has competitive value. 3M v. Pribyl, 259

F.3d 587, 595–96 (7th Cir. 2001); accord Restatement (Third) of

Unfair Competition § 39 cmt. f.

By the same token, a company does not forfeit trade secret

protection by publicly displaying or selling a product unless

the trade secret is “readily ascertainable” upon examination

of the product. Restatement (Third) of Unfair Competition

§ 39 cmt. f. (“[I]f acquisition of the information through an ex‐

amination of a competitor’s product would be difficult, costly,

or time‐consuming, the trade secret owner retains protection

against an improper acquisition, disclosure, or use.”); accord

Televation Telecomm. Sys., Inc. v. Saindon, 522 N.E.2d 1359, 1365

(Ill. App. Ct. 1988); 1 Milgrim on Trade Secrets § 1.05; see also

Hicklin Eng’g, L.C. v. Bartell, 439 F.3d 346, 350 (7th Cir. 2006);

Thermodyne Food Serv. Prod., Inc. v. McDonald’s Corp., 940 F.

Supp. 1300, 1307 (N.D. Ill. 1996).

These teachings reveal a critical flaw in Aegis’s argument.

Aegis contends that the district court legally erred in conclud‐

ing that information about the ProLift could remain a pro‐

tected trade secret after Life Spine patented, displayed, and

sold the device to hospitals and surgeons. Aegis appears to

view trade secret protection as an all‐or‐nothing proposition

for a given product—either it exists, or it does not. But the in‐

quiry is more nuanced than that. We focus on the precise in‐

formation that the plaintiff seeks to protect and ask if it qual‐

ifies as a trade secret under the relevant statutory definition.

That is precisely what the district court did here; it did not

legally err. To be sure, if it turns out that the precise infor‐

mation is known to the public, or is general knowledge in the

No. 21‐1649 15

industry, then there is no trade secret. Ruckelshaus, 467 U.S. at

1002. But whether the information is public is a question of

fact. Learning Curve, 342 F.3d at 723; Atl. Rsch. Mktg. Sys., Inc.

v. Troy, 659 F.3d 1345, 1357 (Fed. Cir. 2011) (whether patent

disclosed alleged trade secrets was a question for the jury).

Properly framed, then, the issue here is factual: Did Life

Spine publicly disclose its alleged trade secrets by patenting,

displaying, and selling the ProLift? The district court found

that the answer was no, and Aegis does not come close to

showing that its detailed finding was clear error.

To begin, ample evidence supports the district court’s

finding that Life Spine’s patent did not disclose the precise

specifications of the ProLift. Life Spine’s engineering manager

testified that the precise specifications are “not easily de‐

rived” from patent materials. Expanding on that point, Life

Spine’s director of engineering explained that the measure‐

ments of the ProLift’s dovetail component are extremely pre‐

cise—down to fractions of a millimeter. And these granular

measurements are not available from patent materials, which

include only “pictures of the part” and do not “go into detail,”

provide dimensions, or “tell anyone how the features connect,

how it’s assembled.” A third party can learn the precise meas‐

urements only with access to the device itself and sophisti‐

cated measurement technology.

To counter this evidence, Aegis points to Life Spine expert

Ashley’s concession that some measurements of the ProLift

are standard in the industry and that an engineer reading Life

Spine’s patent would have a good “starting point” for ascer‐

taining some of the other measurements. But Ashley’s testi‐

mony does not support a finding that every dimension and

measurement of the ProLift is in the public domain. Rather, it

16 No. 21‐1649

supports a finding that the ProLift patent would be helpful to

a company developing a competing product—a fact that is

unremarkable and undisputed in this litigation. Nowhere did

Ashley testify that Life Spine’s patent materials disclose the

exact dimensions and measurements of every ProLift compo‐

nent. And it is these dimensions and measurements, rather

than the product itself, which Life Spine seeks to protect as a

trade secret.

Nor can Aegis show that the district court clearly erred in

finding that Life Spine’s displays and sales did not disclose

the precise specifications of the ProLift. The evidence

showed—and Aegis does not dispute—that those who attend

ProLift displays do not have unfettered access to the device.

Rather, Life Spine supervises them as they handle the device,

much like a jeweler supervises someone trying on a watch.

As for sales, the only purchasers of the ProLift are hospi‐

tals and surgeons, who purchase the device for use in sched‐

uled surgeries. The evidence showed that Life Spine takes

many precautions to safeguard the device prior to surgery. A

Life Spine representative testified that Life Spine or its distrib‐

utors ship the ProLift in sealed boxes affixed with antitamper‐

ing stickers. For sterilization purposes, the boxes remain

sealed until surgery. Moreover, Life Spine requires its distrib‐

utors to oversee the devices until surgery. Distributors inspect

the devices “prior to surgery and through surgery.” They

keep documentation about the surgery and confirm with the

hospital that the surgery went as planned. They must even be

present in the operating room “to assist and answer any ques‐

tions that the surgeon or his surgical staff has regarding the

product that’s being used.” While carrying out these tasks, the

distributors act as fiduciaries for Life Spine’s property.

No. 21‐1649 17

Relying on this evidence, the district court found that Life

Spine did not publicly disclose the precise specifications of the

ProLift by selling it for use in surgeries. Aegis strains to ex‐

plain why that finding was clear error. Distributors are bound

by confidentiality agreements, so Aegis is left to suggest that

surgeons or patients, who are not similarly bound, might re‐

verse engineer the device. This speculative argument is hard

to accept. As just mentioned, distributors acting as fiduciaries

sell the device for use in specific surgeries and oversee the de‐

vice throughout the process. Even apart from that, it seems

doubtful that the hospitals or surgeons purchasing the device

for use in planned surgeries would secretly unpackage the de‐

vice, measure all its components with specialized measure‐

ment technology, reassemble the device, and then use the de‐

vice in the surgery. It seems even more unlikely that a device

would be removed from a patient’s body and then reverse en‐

gineered. Aegis has not identified any evidence that supports

these unfounded scenarios.

The district court was not obligated to credit Aegis’s spec‐

ulative and factually unsupported hypotheses. After all, the

owner of a trade secret need only take “reasonable measures”

to preserve secrecy. 18 U.S.C. § 1839(3). Life Spine takes many

steps to protect the secrecy of the precise specifications of the

ProLift. It does not take every conceivable measure—but it is

not required to do so. See Rockwell Graphic Sys., 925 F.2d at

177–80. The district court’s factual finding that the precise

specifications of the ProLift are trade secrets has substantial

evidentiary support and does not approach clear error.

Unable to show clear error, Aegis retreats to legal argu‐

ments. It leans heavily on the Eleventh Circuit’s decision in

Roboserve, Ltd. v. Tom’s Foods, Inc., 940 F.2d 1441 (11th Cir.

18 No. 21‐1649

1991). But Roboserve is distinguishable. There, the court held

that Roboserve lost trade secret protection in a vending ma‐

chine by selling nearly 1,300 machines to a company that re‐

sold them to distributors who had “no direct connection to

Roboserve.” Id. at 1455. In other words, Roboserve’s vending

machine was not secret because countless distributors had un‐

limited access to it. Here, by contrast, the district court found

that Life Spine’s trade secrets are not in the public domain;

rather, they are accessible only to third parties who sign con‐

fidentiality agreements.

***

Aegis only briefly challenges the district court’s finding

that Life Spine’s testing data and pricing information qualify

as trade secrets. Aegis claims the testing data was not a trade

secret because, at most, Aegis obtained the information by re‐

verse engineering a publicly disclosed product. As explained,

though, the district court found that the relevant details of the

ProLift were not public, so this argument fails for reasons de‐

scribed above.

As to pricing, Aegis suggests that it obtained no economic

value from that information. But the district court found that

Aegis used its knowledge of the ProLift distributor price to

undercut Life Spine in competing for customers. And, in any

event, trade secret protection extends to information that has

“actual or potential value.” 18 U.S.C. § 1839(3) (emphasis

added). Aegis argues as well that the district court applied the

wrong standard when it concluded that Life Spine had only

“some likelihood” of success in showing that its standard dis‐

tributor price is a trade secret that Aegis misappropriated. But

the court did not err: “Some likelihood” is the correct stand‐

ard. Mays, 974 F.3d at 822; see also Pritzker, 973 F.3d at 763

No. 21‐1649 19

(noting that the overlapping standard for granting a motion

to stay requires a “strong showing” of success).

2. Breach of Contract

The district court found that Life Spine was likely to suc‐

ceed in proving that Aegis breached three sections of the dis‐

tribution agreement: the confidentiality provisions, the fidu‐

ciary duty provisions, and the anticopying provisions. Aegis

challenges some aspects of these findings, along with the

court’s preliminary determination that the relevant provi‐

sions survived the expiration of the distribution agreement.

Confidentiality. In the distribution agreement, Aegis

promised “not to disclose” Life Spine’s confidential infor‐

mation and to use it “only for the purpose set forth in this

Agreement.” It also required Aegis to train its employees on

their confidentiality obligations. The district court found that

Life Spine had a “high likelihood of success” on its claim that

Aegis breached the confidentiality provisions by sharing Life

Spine’s confidential information—specifically, the ProLift de‐

vices, pricing data, and the email about the custom installer—

with L&K, and by failing to train its employees on their con‐

fidentiality obligations.

Aegis has little to say on this score. Relying on its trade

secret argument, Aegis contends that the supposedly confi‐

dential information was already public, thus falling outside

the agreement’s protections. But this argument fails for rea‐

sons already explained: Aegis has not shown that the district

court clearly erred in finding that Life Spine did not publicly

disclose its alleged trade secrets.

As for its failure to train its employees on their confidenti‐

ality obligations, Aegis maintains that Life Spine never

20 No. 21‐1649

demonstrated how that breach led to any harm. But as the dis‐

trict court noted, two Aegis employees who admittedly never

read the distribution agreement worked with L&K to develop

the AccelFix‐XT. This evidence permitted a finding that Ae‐

gis’s failure to train its employees contributed to Life Spine’s

harm: If the employees had known of their confidentiality ob‐

ligations, it is reasonable to infer that they may not have par‐

ticipated in a scheme to disclose Life Spine’s confidential in‐

formation to a direct competitor.

Fiduciary duties. The distribution agreement required Ae‐

gis to “maintain custody and/or control of each item of Inven‐

tory in a fiduciary capacity, as a trustee of [Life Spine’s] prop‐

erty rights therein.” The district court found that Aegis vio‐

lated its fiduciary duties by transferring custody of the ProLift

devices to L&K, and by sharing the ProLift with its surgeon

consultants.

Aegis maintains that, even if it breached its fiduciary du‐

ties, the injunction is overbroad. We disagree. The district

court found that Aegis shipped ProLift devices to L&K to help

it develop a competing product. It shared the devices with its

consultants, too, so that they could provide feedback. The fi‐

nal product—the AccelFix‐XT—could reasonably be viewed

as a product of those breaches, given that both breaches fur‐

thered its development. An injunction prohibiting Aegis from

profiting from the product of its breaches is proportionate. Cf.

Foodcomm Int’l v. Barry, 328 F.3d 300, 305 (7th Cir. 2003).

Anticopying. The distribution agreement forbade Aegis

from “copy[ing],” “reverse engineer[ing],” or “creat[ing] de‐

rivative works” based on the ProLift. The district court found,

however, that Life Spine was likely to succeed in proving that

Aegis did just those things in concert with L&K. Aegis’s

No. 21‐1649 21

defense is legal, rather than factual. It contends that federal

patent law preempts the anticopying provision, such that its

breach (if any) of that provision cannot sustain the injunction.

This argument surfaces for the first time on appeal, so it is

waived. See Henry v. Hulett, 969 F.3d 769, 786 (7th Cir. 2020)

(en banc). It is also meritless. Courts rarely, if ever, hold that

federal intellectual property law preempts a “simple two‐

party contract,” which binds only the parties to the contract

and therefore does not frustrate federal policies. ProCD, Inc.

v. Zeidenberg, 86 F.3d 1447, 1453–55 (7th Cir. 1996); accord Bow‐

ers v. Baystate Techs., Inc., 320 F.3d 1317, 1323–26 (Fed. Cir.

2003); see also Aronson v. Quick Point Pencil Co., 440 U.S. 257,

264 (1979). Aegis does not convince us that the agreement’s

anticopying provisions interfere with federal patent policy.

Survival clause. As a more general matter, Aegis argues

that the distribution agreement did not apply to its direct pur‐

chase of 45 ProLift devices in December 2018, months after the

agreement expired on August 31, 2018. It disclaims any sup‐

posed breaches flowing from those direct sales. The district

court rejected this argument because of the agreement’s sur‐

vival clause, which provides: “Notwithstanding anything to

the contrary in this Agreement,” the relevant provisions “will

survive the expiration or termination of this Agreement.” Ae‐

gis maintains that the December 2018 purchases were not

governed by the distribution agreement because they post‐

dated its expiration and they were direct purchases rather

than consignment‐based sales (in contrast to the parties’ ear‐

lier arrangement).

We need not, and do not, resolve this issue because even

without the December 2018 sales, there was plenty of evi‐

dence supporting the district court’s finding that Aegis

22 No. 21‐1649

breached the relevant contract provisions. Aegis does not dis‐

pute, for example, that it was bound by the distribution agree‐

ment in May and June 2018, when it shipped ProLift devices

to L&K. And the district court permissibly found that those

shipments alone breached Aegis’s contractual duties: they

breached the fiduciary duty provisions because Aegis was re‐

quired to maintain custody over the shipped devices; they

breached the confidentiality provisions because the shipped

devices contained Life Spine’s confidential information; and

they breached the anticopying provisions because, as the dis‐

trict court found, Aegis and L&K used the shipped devices to

reverse engineer the ProLift. In fact, L&K told Aegis after re‐

ceiving the ProLift installer that it was copying its basic de‐

sign. So, even without the breaches, if any, stemming from the

December 2018 sales, the district court’s breach of contract

analysis stands.

Even so, we make a few observations for further proceed‐

ings. The survival clause, though relevant, does not fully re‐

solve this issue. That clause merely provides that the parties’

duties will survive the expiration of the agreement. But that

begs the question: What is the scope of those duties? Answer‐

ing that question requires examining precisely what the par‐

ties’ duties were under the distribution agreement. Survival

clause aside, a separate question is whether the parties en‐

tered a binding oral contract to renew the distribution agree‐

ment in September 2018, such that its terms remained in effect

in December 2018. The agreement provides that it “may be

extended by mutual consent of both parties in writing.” And

indeed, the parties pursued that option twice, executing two

written addenda that extended the agreement by four

months. But even if the agreement implicitly banned oral ex‐

tensions, Illinois law (which governs all claims under the

No. 21‐1649 23

agreement) permits oral modification despite such bans. See,

e.g., U.S. Neurosurgical, Inc. v. City of Chicago, 572 F.3d 325, 332

(7th Cir. 2009); Czapla v. Commerz Futures, LLC, 114 F. Supp.

2d 715, 718–19 (N.D. Ill. 2000); A.W. Wendell & Sons, Inc. v.

Qazi, 626 N.E.2d 280, 287 (Ill. App. Ct. 1993). Neither the court

below nor the parties fully address these issues, so we do not

resolve them in this appeal.

B. Irreparable Harm

A finding of irreparable harm absent an injunction “is a

threshold requirement for granting a preliminary injunction.”

Foodcomm, 328 F.3d at 304. Harm is irreparable if legal reme‐

dies are inadequate to cure it. Id. Inadequate “does not mean

wholly ineffectual; rather, the remedy must be seriously defi‐

cient as compared to the harm suffered.” Id.

Aegis contends that the district court wrongly relied on a

presumption of irreparable harm. It adds that the harm stem‐

ming from Life Spine’s loss of customers and market share is

quantifiable and thus remediable through damages.

To start, we agree that the district court erred in relying on

a presumption of irreparable harm. The district court thought

a presumption of irreparable harm attached upon a showing

of likely success on a trade secret claim. And indeed, that used

to be true in this circuit. Atari, Inc. v. N. Am. Philips Consumer

Elecs. Corp., 672 F.2d 607, 620 (7th Cir. 1982). But the Supreme

Court rejected such a presumption in eBay Inc. v. Mer‐

cExchange, L.L.C., 547 U.S. 388, 393 (2006), as we explained in

Flava Works, Inc. v. Gunter, 689 F.3d 754, 755 (7th Cir. 2012); see

also First W. Cap. Mgmt. Co. v. Malamed, 874 F.3d 1136, 1143

(10th Cir. 2017).

24 No. 21‐1649

All the same, the court’s error was harmless. The court

spent one page of its analysis on the presumption before mov‐

ing on to explain why Life Spine had shown irreparable harm

even without the presumption. For one thing, Life Spine pre‐

sented evidence that it would lose customers and market

share because Aegis was marketing the AccelFix‐XT “in the

same finite pool of hospitals and surgeons in which Life Spine

markets the ProLift.” Granted, harm stemming from lost cus‐

tomers or contracts may be quantifiable if the lost customers

or contracts are identifiable. But here, the district court found

that they were not fully identifiable. Rather, because hospitals

do not publicize their contracts for spinal products, identify‐

ing and quantifying lost business “would be especially diffi‐

cult” for Life Spine. And we have held that “it is precisely the

difficulty of pinning down what business has been or will be

lost that makes an injury ‘irreparable.’” Hess Newmark Owens

Wolf, Inc. v. Owens, 415 F.3d 630, 632 (7th Cir. 2005).

Beyond lost customers and market share, the district court

found that Life Spine had “some likelihood” of proving irrep‐

arable harm stemming from the loss of goodwill and reputa‐

tion. The court explained that Life Spine had worked to de‐

velop “niche contracts” with hospitals by marketing the Pro‐

Lift as a unique product. The nearly identical AccelFix‐XT

would undercut that strategy, thereby damaging Life Spine’s

goodwill and reputation. And it is well established that the

loss of goodwill and reputation, if proven, can constitute ir‐

reparable harm. Stuller, Inc. v. Steak N Shake Enters., Inc., 695

F.3d 676, 680 (7th Cir. 2012); 11A Charles Alan Wright & Ar‐

thur R. Miller, Federal Practice & Procedure § 2948.1 (3d ed. 2002

& April 2021 Supp.) (“Injury to reputation or goodwill is not

easily measurable in monetary terms, and so often is viewed

as irreparable.”).

No. 21‐1649 25

The district court’s finding of irreparable harm stemming

from loss of customers and loss of goodwill and reputation is

sufficient to sustain the injunction, so its error in applying a

presumption of irreparable harm does not warrant reversal.

We do not rely on the court’s finding of irreparable harm

stemming from “price erosion” because it is not clear to us

why any such harm (e.g., being forced to reduce prices to re‐

main competitive) would not be quantifiable.

C. Balancing Test and the Public Interest

We easily uphold the district court’s careful balancing of

the harms. The court acknowledged that Aegis’s purported

harms—pulling a product, losing revenue, laying off employ‐

ees, and possibly going out of business—were “real and seri‐

ous harms.” It found, however, that the evidence did not fully

support Aegis’s claimed harms: Aegis had existed for a dec‐

ade before it started selling the AccelFix‐XT, and nothing in

the injunction prevented it from selling other products, in‐

cluding other expandable cage products. As such, the poten‐

tial harm to Aegis did not tip the balance. In the end, the court

found that “the strength of Life Spine’s showing of likely suc‐

cess” on the merits, “its strong showing of irreparable harm,

and the public’s interest in the enforcement of contracts and

protection of trade secrets and confidential information” out‐

weighed “the relatively weak evidence that Aegis would suf‐

fer catastrophic harm under the proposed injunction.”

Beyond disagreeing with how the court balanced the

harms, Aegis gives no good reason why the court abused its

discretion in balancing the harms. The court acknowledged

the competing interests at stake, properly calibrated the in‐

quiry based on Life Spine’s strong merits showing, and con‐

sidered the public interest. We find no abuse of discretion.

26 No. 21‐1649

III. Conclusion

For these reasons, we affirm the preliminary injunction.

We commend Judge Kim for his thorough and precise analy‐

sis in this complex case.