UAE Formula Protection Instinct

A story about how Suzy Batiz used her intuition to protect her company's trade secret formula when dealing with UAE expansion.

"We were going into the UAE and my attorney calls me saying we're going to have to give the formula up to the government of Saudi Arabia. He said it's just legal, we have to, and he found us a female attorney. We had the call set up where I was going to have to give away my formula, which is my trade secret - kind of like Kentucky Fried Chicken.

I'm driving to work, and 10 minutes after the call was supposed to take place, my assistant calls me panicked. She says 'I don't know what happened. I called the hotel before the call, I got through, I've tried every number, I've tried 3 phones.' I told her to calm down and settle down. She says the call will not go through. I said 'Something's not right, just stop. Call the attorney and tell him to find us another attorney.'

My attorney knows me, so he finds another attorney. Two months later, he comes in and says 'Suzy, you're not gonna believe this - with the new attorney, we don't have to give up the formula.' Had we given up the formula, it would have been public knowledge. What I did is I realized there was struggle in this phone call, and whenever there's struggle, I stop and go 'hold on, something's not quite right.' This is how intuitive I'm talking about."