Federal Judiciary

Petition for Writ of Mandamus Denied in Eolas case (In re Google)

By Michael C. Smith

One of the more interesting venue opinion from the Eastern District of Texas recently is the Eolas case from last fall, which I posted on a few months back.  In Eolas v. Adobe, 6:09cv446 (9/28/10), the party lineup included some 23 defendants, with several located in Texas, and four in the Eastern District of Texas proper.  A noteworthy part of the Court's analysis in this case was its analysis of the plaintiff's location in the Eastern District.  While careful to note that he was not giving weight to the plaintiff's choice of forum, as it is already included in the weight a defendant must carry to justify a transfer, the Court rejected defendants' contention that the plaintiff's location should be rejected because it is "recent and insubstantial." "While Eolas did recently relocate to the Eastern District of Texas," Judge Davis wrote, "Eolas is conducting its normal business here. Its Chief Legal Officer and his family have relocated here and own a home here. Eolas?s only corporate office is located in Tyler, Texas, and board of directors meetings are conducted here. Most of Eolas?s tangible and intangible property, including all of the company?s electronic and non-electronic files, books, and records, are located in Tyler. Eolas is currently testing its AnatLab product at the University of Texas at Tyler and employs seven people in Tyler to conduct the testing."

Today in In re Google, Misc. Docket No. 968, the Federal Circuit denied the petition for writ of mandamus in this case in a short opinion.

I have not previously posted on the recent Federal Circuit opinion from a district other than the Eastern District denying a petition for mandamus on an order denying transfer (I have not had time to analyze it, and since it applied non-Fifth Circuit (In re VW)venue and mandamus standards, it's sort of of only academic interest to me), but I did want to mention this one since it was from the Eastern District.  2010 ended with a pair of December 2010 rulings which brought the year's total to three granted and three denied.  2011 has started with two denials, one of which was from the Eastern District of Texas.  If I've missed any, someone please let me know and I will update this post.

Full post as published by Eastern District of Texas Federal Court Practice on March 04, 2011 (boomark / email).