In In re: Apple Inc., No. 22-162 (Nov. 8, 2022), the CAFC granted Apple’s petition for a writ of mandamus and ordered the United States District Court for the Western District of Texas (WDTX) to vacate its scheduling order and postpone fact discovery until the resolution of Apple’s motion to transfer. The CAFC held that the district court abused its discretion by requiring the parties to litigate the substantive merits of the case pending a decision on Apple’s motion.
Apple was sued in the WDTX for patent infringement. It moved to transfer to the United States District Court for the Northern District of California on grounds of convenience of the parties and witnesses under 28 U.S.C. § 1404(a). Apple submitted an employee declaration in support of the motion. Before the close of venue discovery, Apple moved for leave to supplement its motion with additional employee declarations, stating that the plaintiff did not oppose a “reasonable continuance” of the transfer proceedings. The WDTX district court granted the motion for leave, but sua sponte ordered the parties to complete fact discovery on the substantive merits of the case and then re-brief the motion to transfer. Apple filed a petition for writ of mandamus requesting that the CAFC order the district court to vacate its scheduling order, promptly rule on Apple’s pending transfer motion, and stay all proceedings on the merits until transfer was resolved.
The CAFC granted Apple’s petition. It first noted that “[a]lthough a district court has discretion in managing its own docket . . . an appellate court may grant mandamus to correct a clearly arbitrary refusal to act on a longstanding pending transfer motion.” The Court held that “it is a clear abuse of discretion to require the parties to expend additional party and court resources litigating the substantive matters of the case while Apple’s motion to transfer unnecessarily lingers on the docket.” The Court did not decide whether merits discovery may ever proceed pending a transfer motion, “only that decision of a transfer motion must proceed expeditiously as the first order of business and that venue discovery must proceed immediately to enable such a prompt decision of the transfer motion.”
Accordingly, the CAFC ordered the district court to vacate its amended scheduling order and postpone fact discovery and other substantive proceedings until after consideration of Apple’s motion for transfer.