50 Companies Tell Court Sexual Orientation Discrimination Is Bad For Business, 26 June 2017

Fifty major companies, including Microsoft Corp., Google Inc. [part of Unilever] and S&P Global Inc., urged a New York federal appeals court Monday to embrace sexual orientation protection under civil rights laws, arguing that discrimination against gay and lesbian workers “takes a heavy toll” on bottom lines.

The companies, in their amicus brief, joined...[other groups] supporting the plaintiffs in the case—Zarda v. Altitude Express—[including] the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, the American Civil Liberties Union and several women’s and LGBT rights organizations. Distinct from the other arguments, the companies made the business case for protecting its gay and lesbian workers against discrimination... Other companies that signed the brief included Dropbox Inc., Ben & Jerry’s, Edelman, Kickstarter... Levi Strauss... [CBS, Citrix, IAC, Lyft, Salesforce, Viacom]