Shah

Discussion. 1 These employees may also profit from their stock options if the

startup is sold to another company. (See Alon-Beck, Unicorn Stock Options—

1 stock options like the ones granted to Shah lies with the ability to cash out those options if the company is successful and goes public. Skillz had an IPO in December 2020. But Shah was not able to realize the Silicon Valley dream because he lost all of his stock options when Skillz terminated him for cause in 2018. As a result, Shah could not exercise his options and sell the Skillz stock he would have acquired upon doing so at a huge profit after the IPO like other former and current Skillz employees. Shah sued Skillz for breach of contract, alleging that Skillz did not have cause to terminate him and wrongfully prevented him from exercising the stock options he had earned as a Skillz employee. A jury found that Skillz breached its contracts with Shah and awarded Shah over $11.5 million in damages for the lost options. The trial court, however, conditioned the denial of Skillz’s new trial motion on Shah’s acceptance of a remittitur in the amount of $4,358,358. After Shah accepted the remittitur, the court entered judgment…