Ryanair is to appeal a High Court decision that a 12-month non-compete clause against its chief operations officer is unenforceable.
The airline had used the clause to prevent Peter Bellew from joining easyJet until 2021.
Ryanair argued Bellew possessed information of immense competitive value and said the non-compete clause meant he was not free to join easyJet until January 2021.
Bellew’s lawyers denied he was subject to the clause, saying it was attached to a share option scheme they said was effectively valueless.
They also argued that the restriction against working for ‘any airline that competes with Ryanair in any market’, was overly broad.
Judge Senan Allen said the wording of the non-compete clause was deemed in the ruling to be too broad.
