# Employee Invention Assignment in the U.S. Virgin Islands[^about] The U.S. Virgin Islands has no employee-invention-assignment statute, so an assignment clause is bounded only by ordinary contract law, the federal patent and copyright overlay, and the common-law rules a Virgin Islands court would select under the Banks methodology — not a California-style own-time carve-out or notice requirement. No Virgin Islands decision on employee-invention ownership was found in our review; the predicted default is that the inventor owns unless hired to invent, with the employer taking at most a shop right, and the enforceability of a post-employment holdover clause is unsettled. ## Can a U.S. Virgin Islands employer require assignment of every invention? {#statutory-carve-out} **Short answer.** There is no statutory ceiling — and no local statute at all. The U.S. Virgin Islands has no employee-invention-assignment statute: no California Labor Code § 2870 analogue, no employer-ownership provision, and no notice requirement. An assignment clause's reach is therefore bounded only by ordinary contract law, the federal patent and copyright overlay, and the common-law rules a Virgin Islands court would select for itself under the territory's post-2011 methodology for choosing its common law [^vic-1-4-reception][^banks-no-mechanical]. The statutory silence is broad. A search of the Virgin Islands Code — including Title 24 (Labor) and Title 11 (Commerce and Trade) — surfaces no invention-assignment, employee-invention-ownership, or carve-out provision of any kind. The nearest neighbors are the territory's Uniform Trade Secrets Act (11 V.I.C. §§ 1001–1010), which supplies the trade-secret backdrop for the confidentiality side of an invention-assignment agreement, and the reception statute discussed below. One currency caveat belongs on the record: the freely searchable compilation of the Virgin Islands Code is a 2019 snapshot, and the official current code is hosted on LexisNexis, so the no-statute conclusion is as of our review date — though nothing in our review suggests any post-2019 enactment on this subject. What makes the territory unusual is where its common law comes from. For most of the territory's history, 1 V.I.C. § 4 directed Virgin Islands courts to the Restatements as the default rules of decision [^vic-1-4-reception]. "The rules of the common law, as expressed in the restatements of the law approved by the American Law Institute, and to the extent not so expressed, as generally understood and applied in the United States, shall be the rules of decision in the courts of the Virgin Islands in cases to which they apply, in the absence of local laws to the contrary."[^vic-1-4-reception] That regime ended with *Banks v. International Rental & Leasing Corp.*, in which the Supreme Court of the Virgin Islands held that the reception statute does not force mechanical adherence to the Restatements [^banks-no-mechanical]. "We conclude that the Legislature did not intend for section 4 of title 1 to compel this Court to mechanically apply the most recent Restatement."[^banks-no-mechanical] In *Government of the Virgin Islands v. Connor*, the same court — quoting *Simon v. Joseph*, which in turn drew on *Matthew v. Herman* — restated the working methodology that replaced automatic Restatement reception [^connor-three-factors]. "courts should consider ‘three non-dispositive factors’ to determine Virgin Islands common law: ‘(1) whether any Virgin Islands courts have previously adopted a particular rule; (2) the position taken by a majority of courts from other jurisdictions; and (3) most importantly, which approach represents the soundest rule for the Virgin Islands.’"[^connor-three-factors] *Connor* also confirmed that the old reception statute no longer controls at all, tracing its demise to the 2004 statute that established the modern territorial judiciary [^connor-implicit-repeal]. "the Legislature implicitly repealed 1 V.I.C. § 4 through its adoption of 4 V.I.C. § 21 in 2004."[^connor-implicit-repeal] The practical consequence is that a Virgin Islands employer can, in principle, contract for assignment more broadly than a California or Washington employer, because no statute carves out own-time inventions from the reach of the clause. But the outer limits are genuinely untested: no Virgin Islands court found in our review has ever construed an employee invention-assignment clause, so any statement about how far such a clause can reach is a prediction about which common-law rule the territory's courts would adopt under the *Banks* factors, not a report of settled local doctrine. ## Must a U.S. Virgin Islands employer notify the employee? {#employee-notice} **Short answer.** Not applicable. Because the U.S. Virgin Islands has no invention-assignment statute, there is no statutory carve-out to notify the employee about and no notice requirement of the kind California imposes under Labor Code § 2872 or Washington imposes under RCW 49.44.140(3). Any disclosure or assignment duty arises from the terms of the agreement itself and from whatever common-law rule a Virgin Islands court would select under the *Banks* methodology [^banks-selection-notice]. There is nothing to give notice of. A notice requirement exists in California and Washington precisely to alert the employee to a statutory own-time carve-out that limits the assignment; the Virgin Islands has enacted no such carve-out, so there is no statutory line for a notice to mark. That is why the entry is marked not applicable rather than a bare no: the question presupposes a statutory carve-out that the territory does not have. Nor is there any Restatement-derived notice formality waiting in the background. Since *Banks*, Virgin Islands courts choose their common-law rules through the three-factor analysis rather than by automatic Restatement reception, and no Virgin Islands decision found in our review has imposed — or even considered — a notice or disclosure formality for invention-assignment agreements [^banks-selection-notice]. "We conclude that the Legislature did not intend for section 4 of title 1 to compel this Court to mechanically apply the most recent Restatement."[^banks-selection-notice] For a multistate employer the takeaway is the inverse of the notice states: a Virgin Islands employer neither has to give a § 2872-style notice nor can rely on one to cure an overbroad clause. The enforceability of the assignment turns entirely on the contract language and on the common-law limits a Virgin Islands court would adopt, not on any statutory notice or disclosure formality. ## Who owns an invention by default in the U.S. Virgin Islands? {#default-ownership} **Short answer.** Most likely the inventor, unless hired to invent — but in the Virgin Islands that is a prediction, not settled local doctrine. No Virgin Islands decision found in our review addresses employee-invention ownership at all, so a court facing the question would select a rule through the *Banks* three-factor analysis, and the rule it would almost certainly select is the federal and majority baseline: rights belong to the employee who conceived the invention, the employer may claim an invention only from an employee hired to invent, and use of the employer's time and materials yields at most a shop right [^stanford-inventor][^dubilier-hired-to-invent]. *Stanford v. Roche* anchors the baseline. The Supreme Court held that even the Bayh-Dole Act did not displace the long-standing rule that an invention belongs to its inventor, treating that premise as the starting point against which any assignment is measured [^stanford-inventor]. "Since 1790, the patent law has operated on the premise that rights in an invention belong to the inventor."[^stanford-inventor] Because ownership starts with the inventor, an employer's title is derivative — it exists only if and to the extent the employee assigned it [^stanford-traceback]. "Thus, although others may acquire an interest in an invention, any such interest — as a general rule — must trace back to the inventor."[^stanford-traceback] The principal exception is the employee hired to invent. Under *United States v. Dubilier Condenser Corp.*, an employee engaged to make a particular invention who succeeds during the term of service must assign the resulting patent to the employer [^dubilier-hired-to-invent]. "One employed to make an invention, who succeeds, during his term of service, in accomplishing that task, is bound to assign to his employer any patent obtained."[^dubilier-hired-to-invent] The most analogous in-circuit authority is *Ingle v. Landis Tool Co.*, a 1921 decision of the Third Circuit — the circuit whose federal courts hear Virgin Islands appeals. Describing and adhering to the rule it had settled in *Pressed Steel Car Co. v. Hansen*, the court framed the condition on which the default turns [^ingle-no-contract]. "in the absence of an express contract or agreement to invent,"[^ingle-no-contract] On that condition, the court explained, the employment relation standing alone gave the employer no title to the employee's invention [^ingle-shop-right]. "did not vest the employer with the entire property right of an invention of the employee, and to the patent monopoly thereof, or to anything more than a shop right to use such invention."[^ingle-shop-right] Applying that rule, the court held that the employee draughtsman kept title to his invention because he had never promised to invent [^ingle-carey-application]. "There was no contract on Carey’s part to invent, and consequently the case, as we have said, falls within the principle of Pressed Steel Car Company v. Hansen, supra."[^ingle-carey-application] *Ingle* is federal patent-era case law, not Virgin Islands common law, and it predates the modern territorial court system — it is persuasive, not binding, on a Virgin Islands court. But it maps cleanly onto the *Banks* factors as *Connor* states them: no Virgin Islands court has adopted a contrary rule, the inventor-first default with hired-to-invent and shop-right exceptions is the position taken by the overwhelming majority of jurisdictions, and an in-circuit pedigree strengthens the argument that it is the soundest rule for the territory [^connor-three-factors-ownership]. The prediction is strong; it is still a prediction, and the dependable path for an employer is a written present-assignment (*hereby assigns*) clause that transfers title automatically on conception rather than leaving ownership to an untested default. ## Are trailing-assignment (holdover) clauses enforceable in the U.S. Virgin Islands? {#holdover-clause-limit} **Short answer.** Unsettled. No Virgin Islands decision found in our review addresses a trailing or holdover invention-assignment clause, and there is no statutory temporal cap because there is no invention-assignment statute at all. What the territory does supply is trial-level restrictive-covenant law testing post-employment restraints for reasonableness — one decision striking an overbroad covenant and one enforcing a reasonable one — and a court would most likely test a holdover clause the same way by analogy. But that is an analogy to covenant law from a different doctrinal box, decided by trial courts before the territory's modern common-law methodology existed, so the holdover question remains genuinely open [^dixon-disfavors-restraints][^williamson-five-pronged-test]. Two gaps define the Virgin Islands picture. First, there is no statute: nothing caps the duration of a post-employment trailing assignment or otherwise limits what such a clause may reach. Second, there is no case: our review found no Virgin Islands decision applying any standard to an invention-holdover clause, so even the choice of framework is a prediction. The closest local law is restrictive-covenant doctrine. In *Virgin Islands Diving Schools/Supplies, Inc. v. Dixon*, the Territorial Court — a trial court — struck a tiered, island-wide non-compete and non-disclosure package as an unreasonable restraint under the Restatement (Second) of Contracts § 188 framework, stressing that the employer had no trade secrets or unique services to protect. The opinion places restraints on employment under a disfavoring presumption [^dixon-disfavors-restraints]. "it is also equally true that the law disfavors agreements which restrain employment."[^dixon-disfavors-restraints] Weighing the covenant's breadth against the employer's actual protectable interest, the *Dixon* court concluded the restraint could not stand — and struck it rather than trimming it [^dixon-restraint-overbroad]. "The sum total of all these factors leads the Court to conclude that the restraint involved here is greater than is needed to protect the Plaintiff's legitimate business interest."[^dixon-restraint-overbroad] The counterpoint is *Williamson v. Hess*, in which the same court — again at trial level — enforced a three-year veterinary non-compete limited to St. Thomas and St. John, applying a multi-factor reasonableness test in which the territory's small-island geography figured on both sides of the analysis [^williamson-five-pronged-test]. "And this five-pronged test of reasonableness must be measured by the circumstances and context in which enforcement is sought."[^williamson-five-pronged-test] Three limits on the analogy keep this cell at unsettled rather than a reasonableness rule. First, both decisions are trial-level: the Supreme Court of the Virgin Islands, established in 2007, has never ruled on restrictive covenants, let alone on invention assignments. Second, both predate *Banks*, so a court today could re-run the full three-factor analysis rather than simply following them — although under the first *Connor* factor they would count as prior Virgin Islands adoption of a reasonableness approach to post-employment restraints [^connor-three-factors-holdover]. Third, a trailing assignment is not a non-compete; extending covenant reasonableness to a clause that assigns post-employment inventions is a bare analogy that no Virgin Islands court has drawn. Reformation is equally open: no Virgin Islands authority found in our review says whether an overbroad clause would be narrowed or simply struck, and the one on-point covenant precedent struck the restraint entirely [^dixon-restraint-overbroad]. > [!NOTE] > **Practice note.** > > Do not treat the U.S. Virgin Islands like a mainland state with settled invention-assignment doctrine — and do not treat it like a carve-out state either. There is no statute, no notice safe harbor, and no Virgin Islands decision on employee inventions, so every rule on this page short of the federal baseline is a prediction about how a court would choose its common law under the territory's rule-selection methodology [^banks-no-mechanical-practice]. Draft with present-assignment (*hereby assigns*) language so title passes automatically rather than resting on a future promise, because ownership starts with the inventor and an employer's rights are only as good as the words that transfer them [^stanford-traceback-practice]. Keep any trailing or holdover assignment narrow, short, and tied to the employer's confidential information and pre-departure work, because the territory's only on-point restraint law disfavors agreements which restrain employment and struck the one overbroad covenant it examined [^dixon-disfavors-restraints], while its reasonableness testing is context-driven and fact-intensive [^williamson-five-pronged-test]. [^about]: By Steven Obiajulu, J.D. Published by [openagreements.org](https://openagreements.org). Last reviewed 2026-07-02. License: CC BY 4.0. Steven Obiajulu, J.D. is admitted in New York, not U.S. Virgin Islands. This article synthesizes U.S. Virgin Islands primary law and is not legal advice from a U.S. Virgin Islands-admitted attorney. This article is for informational purposes only and does not create an attorney-client relationship. CC BY 4.0. Cite as Steven Obiajulu, *Employee Invention Assignment in the U.S. Virgin Islands*, OpenAgreements (last updated July 2, 2026), https://openagreements.org/practice-guides/invention-assignment/us/virgin-islands. [^vic-1-4-reception]: **1 V.I.C. § 4 — Application of common law; restatements** — "The rules of the common law, as expressed in the restatements of the law approved by the American Law Institute, and to the extent not so expressed, as generally understood and applied in the United States, shall be the rules of decision in the courts of the Virgin Islands in cases to which they apply, in the absence of local laws to the contrary." *1 V.I.C. § 4.* [^banks-no-mechanical]: **Banks v. International Rental & Leasing Corp.** — "We conclude that the Legislature did not intend for section 4 of title 1 to compel this Court to mechanically apply the most recent Restatement." *Banks v. Int'l Rental & Leasing Corp., 55 V.I. 967 (V.I. 2011).* [^connor-three-factors]: **Government of the Virgin Islands v. Connor** — "courts should consider ‘three non-dispositive factors’ to determine Virgin Islands common law: ‘(1) whether any Virgin Islands courts have previously adopted a particular rule; (2) the position taken by a majority of courts from other jurisdictions; and (3) most importantly, which approach represents the soundest rule for the Virgin Islands.’" *Gov't of the V.I. v. Connor, 60 V.I. 597 (V.I. 2014).* [^connor-implicit-repeal]: **Government of the Virgin Islands v. Connor** — "the Legislature implicitly repealed 1 V.I.C. § 4 through its adoption of 4 V.I.C. § 21 in 2004." *Gov't of the V.I. v. Connor, 60 V.I. 597 (V.I. 2014).* [^banks-selection-notice]: **Banks v. International Rental & Leasing Corp.** — "We conclude that the Legislature did not intend for section 4 of title 1 to compel this Court to mechanically apply the most recent Restatement." *Banks v. Int'l Rental & Leasing Corp., 55 V.I. 967 (V.I. 2011).* [^stanford-inventor]: **Bd. of Trustees of the Leland Stanford Junior Univ. v. Roche Molecular Systems** — "Since 1790, the patent law has operated on the premise that rights in an invention belong to the inventor." *Bd. of Trustees of the Leland Stanford Junior Univ. v. Roche Molecular Sys., Inc., 563 U.S. 776 (2011).* [^dubilier-hired-to-invent]: **United States v. Dubilier Condenser Corp.** — "One employed to make an invention, who succeeds, during his term of service, in accomplishing that task, is bound to assign to his employer any patent obtained." *United States v. Dubilier Condenser Corp., 289 U.S. 178 (1933).* [^stanford-traceback]: **Bd. of Trustees of the Leland Stanford Junior Univ. v. Roche Molecular Systems** — "Thus, although others may acquire an interest in an invention, any such interest — as a general rule — must trace back to the inventor." *Bd. of Trustees of the Leland Stanford Junior Univ. v. Roche Molecular Sys., Inc., 563 U.S. 776 (2011).* [^ingle-no-contract]: **Ingle v. Landis Tool Co.** — "in the absence of an express contract or agreement to invent," *Ingle v. Landis Tool Co., 272 F. 464 (3d Cir. 1921).* [^ingle-shop-right]: **Ingle v. Landis Tool Co.** — "did not vest the employer with the entire property right of an invention of the employee, and to the patent monopoly thereof, or to anything more than a shop right to use such invention." *Ingle v. Landis Tool Co., 272 F. 464 (3d Cir. 1921).* [^ingle-carey-application]: **Ingle v. Landis Tool Co.** — "There was no contract on Carey’s part to invent, and consequently the case, as we have said, falls within the principle of Pressed Steel Car Company v. Hansen, supra." *Ingle v. Landis Tool Co., 272 F. 464 (3d Cir. 1921).* [^connor-three-factors-ownership]: **Government of the Virgin Islands v. Connor** — "courts should consider ‘three non-dispositive factors’ to determine Virgin Islands common law: ‘(1) whether any Virgin Islands courts have previously adopted a particular rule; (2) the position taken by a majority of courts from other jurisdictions; and (3) most importantly, which approach represents the soundest rule for the Virgin Islands.’" *Gov't of the V.I. v. Connor, 60 V.I. 597 (V.I. 2014).* [^dixon-disfavors-restraints]: **Virgin Islands Diving Schools/Supplies, Inc. v. Dixon** — "it is also equally true that the law disfavors agreements which restrain employment." *Virgin Islands Diving Schools/Supplies, Inc. v. Dixon, Civil No. 1046/1982 (V.I. Terr. Ct. Oct. 19, 1983).* [^williamson-five-pronged-test]: **Williamson v. Hess** — "And this five-pronged test of reasonableness must be measured by the circumstances and context in which enforcement is sought." *Williamson v. Hess, 16 V.I. 284 (V.I. Terr. Ct. 1979).* [^dixon-restraint-overbroad]: **Virgin Islands Diving Schools/Supplies, Inc. v. Dixon** — "The sum total of all these factors leads the Court to conclude that the restraint involved here is greater than is needed to protect the Plaintiff's legitimate business interest." *Virgin Islands Diving Schools/Supplies, Inc. v. Dixon, Civil No. 1046/1982 (V.I. Terr. Ct. Oct. 19, 1983).* [^connor-three-factors-holdover]: **Government of the Virgin Islands v. Connor** — "courts should consider ‘three non-dispositive factors’ to determine Virgin Islands common law: ‘(1) whether any Virgin Islands courts have previously adopted a particular rule; (2) the position taken by a majority of courts from other jurisdictions; and (3) most importantly, which approach represents the soundest rule for the Virgin Islands.’" *Gov't of the V.I. v. Connor, 60 V.I. 597 (V.I. 2014).* [^banks-no-mechanical-practice]: **Banks v. International Rental & Leasing Corp.** — "We conclude that the Legislature did not intend for section 4 of title 1 to compel this Court to mechanically apply the most recent Restatement." *Banks v. Int'l Rental & Leasing Corp., 55 V.I. 967 (V.I. 2011).* [^stanford-traceback-practice]: **Bd. of Trustees of the Leland Stanford Junior Univ. v. Roche Molecular Systems** — "Thus, although others may acquire an interest in an invention, any such interest — as a general rule — must trace back to the inventor." *Bd. of Trustees of the Leland Stanford Junior Univ. v. Roche Molecular Sys., Inc., 563 U.S. 776 (2011).*