U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, In Re: Google LLC, Docket No. 2023-101

Motion to Transfer

 

Venue

 

Jurisdiction

 

Federal Law

 

 

 

 

On Petition for Writ of Mandamus to the United States District Court for the Western District of Texas in No. 6:21-cv-00985-ADA

 

 

 

Google LLC (“Google”) petitions for a writ of mandamus directing the United States District Court for the Western District of Texas to vacate its order denying Google’s motion to transfer and to transfer the case to the United States District Court for the Northern District of California. (…) For the following reasons, we grant the petition and direct transfer.

 

 

Pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1404(a), a district court may transfer any civil action to any other district court where the action might have been brought for the convenience of parties and witnesses and in the interest of justice.

 

 

In re Planned Parenthood Fed. of Am., Inc., 52 F.4th 625, 629 (5th Cir. 2022), when a movant “demonstrates that the transferee venue is clearly more convenient” the district court “should” grant transfer, In re Volkswagen of Am., Inc., 545 F.3d 304, 315 (5th Cir. 2008) (en banc); see also Planned Parenthood, 52 F.4th at 629 (“The ultimate inquiry is whether the destination venue is ‘clearly more convenient than the venue chosen by the plaintiff.’”) (quoting Volkswagen, 545 F.3d at 315).

 

 

The Fifth Circuit has identified “private and public interest factors,” which are “not necessarily exhaustive or exclusive,” to be evaluated in connection with determining whether a case should be transferred. Planned Parenthood, 52 F.4th at 630 (internal quotation marks omitted). The private interest factors are: (1) the relative ease of access to sources of proof; (2) the availability of compulsory process to secure the attendance of witnesses; (3) the cost of attendance for willing witnesses; and (4) all other practical problems that make trial of a case easy, expeditious, and inexpensive. Id. The public interest factors are: (1) the administrative difficulties flowing from court congestion; (2) the local interest in having localized interests decided at home; (3) the familiarity of the forum with the law that will govern the case; and (4) the avoidance of unnecessary problems of conflict of laws or in the application of foreign law. Id.

 

 

The district court held that the “administrative difficulties flowing from court congestion” factor weighed slightly against transfer. While we defer to the district court’s assessment of the average time to trial data, see Planned Parenthood, 52 F.4th at 631; In re Genentech, Inc., 566 F.3d 1338, 1347 (Fed. Cir. 2009) (“We do not disturb the district court’s suggestion that it could dispose of the case more quickly than if the case was transferred to the Northern District of California.”), in this case it was a clear abuse of discretion to accord this factor any weight, see Juniper, 14 F.4th at 1322 (discounting time-to-trial difference because there was no “need of a quick resolution” where patentee lacked “position in the market . . . being threatened”). It appears undisputed that Jawbone (unlike its predecessor owners of the patents) is not engaged in product competition in the marketplace and is not threatened in the market in a way that, in other patent cases, might add urgency to case resolution and give some significance to the time-to-trial difference. Nor does the record reveal any other basis on which to accord significance to whatever greater speed the district court speculates it could reach trial as compared to Northern California. See Genentech, 566 F.3d at 1347 (describing this factor as “most speculative”). This factor, then, is neutral.

 

 

By contrast, the events giving rise to this patent infringement suit clearly have a particularized connection with Northern California. The patented technology was invented in, and the patents prosecuted from, that forum. Additionally, the district court found that Google developed the accused products in the Northern District, notwithstanding Google’s separate office in Austin. Appx932; see also Def. Distributed v. Bruck, 30 F.4th 414, 435 (5th Cir. 2022) (“The local interest in having localized interests decided at home, ‘most notably regards not merely the parties’ significant connections to each forum writ large, but rather the significant connections between a particular venue and the events that gave rise to a suit.’”) (quoting In re Apple Inc., 979 F.3d 1332, 1345 (Fed. Cir. 2020)). It was clear error not to find that the local interest factor favors transfer.

 

 

We agree with the district court, and both parties, that the “familiarity of the forum with the law that will govern the case” and the “problems associated with conflicts of law” are neutral.

 

 

In sum, on the record before us, four factors favor transfer and four factors are neutral. No factor weighs against transfer. The center of gravity of this action, focusing on the Volkswagen factors and the overriding convenience inquiry, is clearly in the Northern District of California, not in the Western District of Texas. The district court clearly erred in finding otherwise and its decision to deny Google’s motion to transfer was a clear abuse of discretion.

 

 

 

 

(U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, Feb. 1^st, 2023, In Re: Google LLC, Docket No. 2023-101)

Atlantic Marine Constr.Co. v. United States Dist. Court for western Dist. of Tex.

Forum-selection clause in a contract: a forum-selection clause may be enforced by a motion to transfer under 28 U.S.C. §1404(a), which provides that “for the convenience of parties and witnesses, in the interest of justice, a district court may transfer any civil action to any other district or division where it might have been brought or to any district or division to which all parties have consented.” When a defendant files a §1404(a) motion, a district court should transfer the case unless extraordinary circumstances unrelated to the convenience of the parties clearly disfavor a transfer.

Normally, a district court considering a §1404(a) motion must evaluate both the private interests of the parties and public-interest considerations. But when the parties’ contract contains a valid forum-selection clause, that clause “represents their agreement as to the most proper forum,” Stewart, 487 U. S., at 31, and should be “given controlling weight in all but the most exceptional cases,” id., at 33 (KENNEDY, J., concurring). The presence of a valid forum-selection clause requires district courts to adjust their usual §1404(a) analysis in three ways. First, the plaintiff’s choice of forum merits no weight, and the plaintiff, as the party defying the forum-selection clause, has the burden of establishing that transfer to the forum for which the parties bargained is unwarranted. Second, the court should not con­sider the parties’ private interests aside from those embodied in the forum-selection clause; it may consider only public interests. Because public-interest factors will rarely defeat a transfer motion, the practi­cal result is that forum-selection clauses should control except in un­usual cases. Third, when a party bound by a forum-selection clause flouts its contractual obligation and files suit in a different forum, a§1404(a) transfer of venue will not carry with it the original venue’s choice-of-law rules. See Van Dusen, supra, at 639.

28 U.S.C. Section 1406(a) and Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(3) allow dismissal only when venue is “wrong” or “improper.” Whether venue is “wrong” or “im­proper” depends exclusively on whether the court in which the case was brought satisfies the requirements of federal venue laws. Title 28 U. S. C. §1391, which governs venue generally, states that “except as otherwise provided by law . . . this section shall govern the venue of all civil actions brought in” federal district courts. §1391(a)(1). It then defines districts in which venue is proper. See §1391(b). If a case falls within one of §1391(b)’s districts, venue is proper; if it does not, venue is improper, and the case must be dis­missed or transferred under §1406(a). Whether the parties’ contract contains a forum-selection clause has no bearing on whether a case falls into one of the specified districts.

Although a forum-selection clause does not render venue in a court “wrong” or “improper” under §1406(a) or Rule 12(b)(3), the clause may be enforced through a motion to transfer under §1404(a), which permits transfer to any other district where venue is proper or to any district to which the parties have agreed by contract or stipu­lation. Section 1404(a), however, governs transfer only within the federal court system. When a forum-selection clause points to a state or foreign forum, the clause may be enforced through the doctrine of forum non conveniens. Section 1404(a) is a codification of that doc­trine for the subset of cases in which the transferee forum is another federal court. Sinochem Int’l Co. v. Malaysia Int’l Shipping Corp., 549 U. S. 422. For all other cases, parties may still invoke the resid­ual forum non conveniens doctrine. See id., at 430 (U.S.S.Ct., 03.12.2013, Atlantic Marine Constr.Co. v. United States Dist. Court for western Dist. of Tex., Docket 12-929,  J. Alito, unanimous).

Election de for contractuelle, forum non conveniens : si la partie demanderesse porte son action devant un autre Tribunal que celui choisi par les parties, c’est par la voie d’une requête en transfert que la partie défenderesse peut s’en plaindre auprès du Tribunal à son avis saisi à tort, cela sur la base de la règle de procédure civile  §1404(a). Dans les cas ordinaires, en statuant sur la requête de transfert, la cour (de district fédérale) prétendument saisie à tort doit évaluer à la fois les intérêts privés des parties et à la fois l’intérêt public. Mais si le contrat conclu par les parties contient une clause de prorogation de for valide, cette clause représente leur accord s’agissant du for le plus approprié, de sorte que cette clause d’élection de for doit être respectée, sauf dans des circonstances tout à fait exceptionnelles. L’existence d’une clause de prorogation de for valide impose aux courts de district d’ajuster de trois manières leur analyse habituelle de la §1404(a) : premièrement, le choix du for par le demandeur ne joue aucun rôle, le demandeur ayant par ailleurs le fardeau d’établir que le for convenu ne peut pas être retenu. Deuxièmement, la cour ne peut pas prendre en considération d’autres intérêts des parties que ceux inclus dans la clause de prorogation de for. La cour ne peut considérer que l’intérêt public. Les cas dans lesquels l’intérêt public s’opposera à un transfert seront rares. Troisièmement, un transfert dans ces circonstances n’a pas pour conséquence que les règles de conflits de loi de la cour choisie à tort devront être appliquées par la cour à laquelle le cas est transféré, cette dernière appliquant ses propres règles de conflit.

La section 1406(a) et la Règle 12(b)(3) des Règles fédérales de procédure civile obligent la cour de district fédérale à rejeter (ou transférer) une demande si le for choisi est erroné ou inapproprié. La liste des fors appropriés se trouve dans la loi. De la sorte, il n’importe pas de savoir si les parties au contrat ont convenu d’une clause de prorogation de for, question irrelevante pour déterminer si un for est erroné ou inapproprié au sens des dispositions précitées. Dans les cas où les deux règles précitées s’appliquent, une requête de transfert à une autre cours de district fédérale peut être déposée au sens de la section 1404(a). Section 1404(a) ne permet un transfert qu’à une autre cour de district fédérale. Si une clause de prorogation de for désigne un for étatique ou un for étranger, la clause peut être effective par le biais de la doctrine du forum inapproprié (forum non conveniens).