Access Optical Networks, Inc. v. Seagate Technology LLC
- Virginia Demarchi
- 5:24-cv-03745
- U.S. District Court · Northern District of California
- 4
In Access Optical Networks v. Seagate Technology, Magistrate Judge DeMarchi granted in part and denied in part requests to seal discovery materials.
Access Optical Networks, Inc. and Seagate Technology LLC, because the order determines which portions of their discovery-related filings and exhibits may remain sealed and requires public redacted versions.
What happened
Access Optical Networks, Inc. v. Seagate Technology LLC concerns requests to keep parts of filings and exhibits secret in a dispute over Access Optical Networks’ disclosure of alleged trade secrets. Seagate filed two requests about Access Optical Networks’ materials, and Access Optical Networks filed its own request concerning its response to Seagate’s motion to compel.
The court applied a rule requiring the party seeking secrecy to show a specific risk of harm. Access Optical Networks said the materials contained technical knowledge developed through more than a decade of research and substantial financial investment, while Seagate argued that Access Optical Networks had not provided enough evidence to justify secrecy.
Magistrate Judge DeMarchi ruled that the alleged trade secrets and specialized technical terms could be sealed, but generic technical terms and commonly used phrases could not. The court therefore granted in part and denied in part the sealing requests and ordered public redacted filings by July 23, 2025.
The detailed version
- Access Optical Networks, Inc. v. Seagate Technology LLC · No. 5:24-cv-03745
- Virginia Demarchi
- July 9, 2025
Background
Seagate filed two administrative motions asking the court to decide whether another party’s materials should be sealed in connection with Seagate’s motion to compel Access Optical Networks, Inc. (AON) to disclose trade secrets. AON supported sealing the materials at issue. AON also filed a separate administrative motion seeking to seal materials connected with its opposition to Seagate’s motion to compel and for a protective order. Seagate opposed that motion.
The sealing requests concerned briefing and exhibits addressing whether AON’s trade-secret disclosure satisfied California Code of Civil Procedure section 2019.210. The materials included alleged technical information about magnetic data storage operations, media optimization, dopant properties, and near-field optics.
Legal standard and arguments
Because the sealing requests arose from a discovery dispute, the court applied the “good cause” standard. That standard requires a particularized showing that specific harm or prejudice would result without a protective order. AON had the burden to make that showing.
AON argued that the information reflected proprietary knowledge, techniques, parameters, and optimized properties developed through more than a decade of research and significant financial investment. AON asserted that public disclosure could cause significant competitive harm. Seagate’s principal objection was that AON had not made an adequate evidentiary showing and relied only on declarations from people without personal knowledge.
Ruling
The court agreed that good cause existed to seal the text of AON’s alleged trade secrets and non-generic technical terminology in the briefing. The court found that AON had not shown good cause to seal generic technical terms and commonly used phrases when they appeared separately from an alleged trade secret.
The court therefore granted, in part, and denied, in part, AON’s requests to seal. For ECF No. 53, Seagate’s motion to compel, the court granted sealing for numerous listed passages and denied sealing for other listed passages. The court granted sealing for the entirety of ECF Nos. 53-2 and 53-3, which were exhibits containing AON’s March 11, 2025 and February 7, 2025 section 2019.210 trade-secret disclosures. For ECF No. 53-4, the court denied sealing for pages 1 and 2. For ECF No. 53-9, the court denied sealing for pages 2, 3, and 5, and granted sealing for page 4 except for the word “knowledge.”
For ECF No. 59, AON’s response to Seagate’s motion to compel and for a protective order, the court granted sealing for numerous listed passages and denied sealing for other listed passages, including portions on pages 19, 21, and 22. For ECF No. 63, Seagate’s reply, the court denied sealing for most listed passages and granted sealing for the listed passage on page 8, line 25.
The order required AON and Seagate to file public redacted versions of their respective briefing by July 23, 2025.
Read the full 4-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.