Activision Blizzard is feeling particularly litigious today as the company has filed a lawsuit against Netflix for poaching talent from the company back in 2018. To quickly recap, former Activision Blizzard CFO Spencer Neumann was fired from the company two years ago for an undisclosed reason. In January of 2019, he was quickly scooped up by Netflix and it seems that the reason for his departure was likely because of negotiations with the streaming juggernaut.

“Netflix unapologetically recruits talent without regard to its ethical and legal obligations,” declared the lawsuit that was filed in the Los Angeles Superior Court today. “To shape its workforce to its desires, Netflix not only ruthlessly fires its own employees that it deems ‘adequate,’ but is engaged in a years-long campaign of unlawfully poaching executives from Netflix’s competitors regardless of their contractual obligations.”

For its part, Netflix’s lawyers have fired back by stating that nothing the company has done is unethical. It believes in “freedom” for its employees from the “Hollywood establishment,” something that Activision Blizzard’s lawyers are not buying. “Netflix’s unlawful conduct is not trailblazing or innovative - it is just reflective of Netflix’s contempt for the law of the State of California,” said attornies O’Melveny and Myers on behalf of the video game giant.

What makes matters worse is that this isn’t the first time Netflix has been sued on the grounds of stealing talent. Roughly 10 months after Neumann began working for the company, an ongoing legal battle between Netflix and 20th Century Fox (which was before the Disney acquisition) was settled in the favor of Fox. At the time, the courts ruled that Netflix would be barred from grabbing any additional personnel from Fox or Disney. Fox wasn’t awarded any monetary value, however.

At present, it’s hard to say exactly where this case will go. The crux of Netflix’s argument doesn’t seem to hold any ground in a legal sense. If it willingly coerced Neumann into breaking a contract he signed with Activision Blizzard, then the company is at fault. It should be relatively cut and dry, though the proceedings will likely take many years to come to a head. Both companies are richer than God and can withstand a long legal battle.

Source: Deadline

READ NEXT: Activision Blizzard Made Over $1 Billion From Microtransactions In Three Months