Spotify is facing a lawsuit for gender discrimination, equal pay violation, and defamation. Hong Perez, a former sales executive at Spotify, filed the suit in New York Supreme Court against the music streaming company.
The complaint alleges that Brian Berner, Spotify's head of U.S. sales, went to the Sundance Film Festival on separate "drug-fueled" occasions in 2016 and 2017 with a group consisting of male employees only.
Perez also claimed in the complaint that a Spotify executive got promoted despite having been involved in a sexual harassment incident. That executive was also found to have taken his male sales staff to strip clubs in Atlantic City. Additionally, Perez accused Spotify's chief financial officer of discouraging diversity at the company. It was also alleged that male employees received a higher pay than their female counterparts did at the company.
In a statement, Spotify said:
At Spotify, we do not tolerate discrimination of any kind at any level. While we cannot comment on the specific details of a pending litigation, these claims are without merit.
Perez also stated in the complaint that soon after Berner got into danger for accepting free tickets to Madison Square Garden and problems around a discounting deal last March, she was wrongly held accountable for the trouble. Perez was fired for allegedly breaking the company’s code of conduct.
The latest incident at Spotify highlights a growing concern over gender discrimination at large tech companies. In 2015, Microsoft received a gender discrimination lawsuit from a former employee. In 2017, Google faced a gender pay equality suit as well.
Source: Variety
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