U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in Washington, D.C. Photo Credit: Michael A. Scarcella/ALM Media

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit on Wednesday refused to place any restrictions on where foreign companies may be sued for patent infringement in the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court's TC Heartland v. Kraft Foods Group Brands ruling.

A three-judge panel of the appellate court denied Taiwan-based smartphone maker HTC Corp.'s petition for a writ of mandamus challenging a lower court's ruling that a foreign corporation can be sued in any U.S. district court.

HTC, which is facing an infringement suit from 3G Licensing, had argued that venue in Delaware was no longer proper following the high court's landmark decision last May, which found that, for the purposes of the patent venue statute, a company resides in its state of incorporation.

The decision has generally limited plaintiffs' ability to seek out supposedly friendly courts to hear their infringement cases against domestic defendants, limiting venue to a domestic firm's home state or districts where it has a “regular and established” place of business.

On Wednesday, however, the Federal Circuit declined to extend TC Heartland's findings to foreign companies, citing the ”long-standing” rule that the patent venue statute does not protect alien defendants.

“At the outset, the patent venue statute was not intended to supplant the long-standing rule that the venue laws do not protect alien defendants,” Chief Judge Sharon Prost wrote in a 20-page order.

“The [Supreme] Court's recent decision in TC Heartland does not alter this conclusion. TC Heartland continued a line of cases that interpreted the relationship between the patent venue statute and the general venue statute.”

In TC Heartland, the Supreme Court overruled a line of cases that held that venue in patent cases was governed by the patent venue statute and erased a line of cases from the Federal Circuit that had instead applied the general venue statute.

However, the justices specifically avoided TC Heartland's impact on foreign defendants, and left open the question of whether the general venue statute's provisions would continue to apply.

U.S. District Chief Judge Leonard P. Stark of the District of Delaware in December dismissed 3G's suit against HTC's Washington state-based subsidiary, HTC America Inc., in light of the TC Heartland ruling. But he allowed the case against the Taiwanese parent to proceed, finding that TC Heartland had not changed binding precedent regarding foreign patent defendants.

In its mandamus petition, HTC argued that Congress had intended through 2011 amendments to the patent venue statute to bring foreign defendants within the protection of U.S. venue laws—a position Prost said would have “broad” implications beyond patent cases.

“Given that this would be a sea change in federal venue law, we expect Congress would make its intent clear, if indeed this was its intent,” she said.

“Congress did not clearly make—and did not otherwise express an intent to make—a change to the rule as it affects foreign corporations.”

Andres Healy, who argued the venue issue on behalf of 3G, praised the decision, saying an adverse ruling could have effectively exempted some foreign actors from ever being sued for infringement in a U.S. court.

“I think it's an important decision for patent holders,” said Healy, a senior associate for Susman Godfrey in Seattle. “If the court went the other way … there would be certain defendants that wouldn't be held accountable for infringement.”

“We are looking forward to continuing to press forward on the merits of the case and hope this decision will allow other plaintiffs to do so as well,” he said.

An attorney for HTC did not return a call Thursday seeking comment on the ruling.

3G was also represented at the Federal Circuit by Houston-based Susman Godfrey partner Alexandra White.

HTC was represented by Palo Alto, California-based Paul Hastings partner Yar R. Chaikovsky and John W. Shaw of Shaw Keller in Wilmington.

The case, before the Federal Circuit, was captioned In re: HTC Corp.