Source: http://caselaw.findlaw.com/us-supreme-court/542/241.html
Timestamp: 2017-05-23 07:05:08
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Matched Legal Cases: ['§1782', '§1782', '§1782', '§1782', '§1782', '§1782', '§1782', '§1782', '§1782', '§1782', '§1782', '§1782', 'Art. 81', 'Art. 82', '§1782', '§1782', '§1782', '§1782', '§1782', '§1782', '§1782', '§1782', '§1782', '§1782', '§1782', '§1782', '§1782', '§1782', '§1782', '§1782', '§1782', '§1782', '§1782', '§1782', '§1782', '§1782', '§1782', '§1696', '§1782', '§1782', '§1782', '§1782', '§1782']

INTEL CORP. v. ADVANCED MICRO DEVICES, INC. [02-572] | FindLaw
INTEL CORP. v. ADVANCED MICRO DEVICES, INC. [02-572]
INTEL CORP. v. ADVANCED MICRO DEVICES, INC., (2004)
Argued: April 20, 2004 Decided: June 21, 2004
Washington, DC For Respondent Advanced
Micro Devices, Inc.:
(c) The "proceeding" for which discovery is sought under §1782(a) must be within reasonable contemplation, but need not be "pending" or "imminent." The Court rejects Intel's argument that the Commission investigation launched by AMD's complaint does not qualify for §1782(a) assistance. Since the 1964 revision, which deleted the prior law's reference to "pending," Congress has not limited judicial assistance under §1782(a) to "pending" adjudicative proceedings. This Court presumes that Congress intends its statutory amendments to have real and substantial effect. Stone v. INS, 514 U. S. 386, 397. The 1964 revision's legislative history corroborates Congress' recognition that judicial assistance would be available for both foreign proceedings and investigations. A 1996 amendment clarifies that §1782(a) covers "criminal investigations conducted before formal accusation." Nothing in that amendment, however, suggests that Congress meant to rein in, rather than to confirm, by way of example, the range of discovery §1782(a) authorizes. Pp. 14-15. (d) Section 1782(a) does not impose a foreign-discoverability requirement. Although §1782(a) expressly shields from discovery matters protected by legally applicable privileges, nothing in §1782(a)'s text limits a district court's production-order authority to materials discoverable in the foreign jurisdiction if located there. Nor does the legislative history suggest that Congress intended to impose a blanket foreign-discoverability rule on §1782(a) assistance. The Court rejects two policy concerns raised by Intel in support of a foreign-discoverability limitation on §1782(a) aid--avoiding offense to foreign governments, and maintaining parity between litigants. While comity and parity concerns may be legitimate touchstones for a district court's exercise of discretion in particular cases, they do not warrant construction of §1782(a)'s text to include a generally applicable foreign-discoverability rule. Moreover, the Court questions whether foreign governments would be offended by a domestic prescription permitting, but not requiring, judicial assistance. A foreign nation may limit discovery within its domain for reasons peculiar to its own legal practices, culture, or traditions; such reasons do not necessarily signal objection to aid from United States federal courts. A foreign tribunal's reluctance to order production of materials present in the United States similarly may signal no resistance to the receipt of evidence gathered pursuant to §1782(a). When the foreign tribunal would readily accept relevant information discovered in the United States, application of a categorical foreign-discoverability rule would be senseless. Concerns about parity among adversaries in litigation likewise provide no sound basis for a cross-the-board foreign-discoverability rule. When information is sought by an "interested person," a district court can condition relief upon reciprocal information exchange. Moreover, the foreign tribunal can place conditions on its acceptance of information, thereby maintaining whatever measure of parity it deems appropriate. The Court also rejects Intel's suggestion that a §1782(a) applicant must show that United States law would allow discovery in domestic litigation analogous to the foreign proceeding. Section 1782 is a provision for assistance to tribunals abroad. It does not direct United States courts to engage in comparative analysis to determine whether analogous proceedings exist here. Comparisons of that order can be fraught with danger. For example, the United States has no close analogue to the Commission regime, under which AMD lacks party status and can participate only as a complainant. Pp. 15-20.
292 F. 3d 664, affirmed.
Ginsburg, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which Rehnquist, C. J., and Stevens, Kennedy, Souter, and Thomas, JJ., joined. Scalia, J., filed an opinion concurring in the judgment. Breyer, J., filed a dissenting opinion. O'Connor, J., took no part in the consideration or decision of the case.
INTEL CORPORATION, PETITIONER v. ADVANCEDMICRO DEVICES, INC.
AMD and Intel are "worldwide competitors in the microprocessor industry." 292 F. 3d 664, 665 (CA9 2002). In October 2000, AMD filed an antitrust complaint with the Directorate-General for Competition (DG-Competition) of the European Commission. Ibid.; App. 41. "The European Commission is the executive and administrative organ of the European Communities." Brief for Commission of European Communities as Amicus Curiae 1 (hereinafter European Commission Amicus Curiae). The Commission exercises responsibility over the wide range of subject areas covered by the European Union treaty; those areas include the treaty provisions, and regulations thereunder, governing competition. See ibid.; Consolidated Versions of Treaty on European Union and Treaty Establishing European Community, Arts. 81 and 82, 2002 O. J. (C 325) 33, 64-65, 67 (hereinafter EC Treaty). The DG-Competition, operating under the Commission's aegis, is the European Union's primary antitrust law enforcer. European Commission Amicus Curiae 2. Within the DG-Competition's domain are anticompetitive agreements (Art. 81) and abuse of dominant market position (Art. 82). Ibid.; EC Treaty 64-65.
AMD's complaint alleged that Intel, in violation of European competition law, had abused its dominant position in the European market through loyalty rebates, exclusive purchasing agreements with manufacturers and retailers, price discrimination, and standard-setting cartels. App. 40-43; Brief for Petitioner 13. AMD recommended that the DG-Competition seek discovery of documents Intel had produced in a private antitrust suit, titled Intergraph Corp. v. Intel Corp., brought in a Federal District Court in Alabama. 3 F. Supp. 2d 1255 (ND Ala. 1998), vacated 195 F. 3d 1346 (CA Fed. 1999), remanded, 88 F. Supp. 2d 1288 (ND Ala. 2000), aff'd 253 F. 3d 695 (CA Fed. 2001); App. 111; App. to Pet. for Cert. 13a-14a.4 After the DG-Competition declined to seek judicial assistance in the United States, AMD, pursuant to §1782(a), petitioned the District Court for the Northern District of California5 for an order directing Intel to produce documents discovered in the Intergraph litigation and on file in the federal court in Alabama. App. to Pet. for Cert. 13a-14a. AMD asserted that it sought the materials in connection with the complaint it had filed with the European Commission. Ibid.6
The District Court denied the application as "[un]supported by applicable authority." Id., at 15a. Reversing that determination, the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit remanded the case for disposition on the merits. 292 F. 3d, at 669. The Court of Appeals noted two points significant to its decision: §1782(a) includes matters before " 'bodies of a quasi-judicial or administrative nature,' " id., at 667 (quoting In re Letters Rogatory from Tokyo District, 539 F. 2d 1216, 1218-1219 (CA9 1976)); and, since 1964, the statute's text has contained "[no] requirement that the proceeding be 'pending,' " ibid. (quoting United States v. Sealed 1, Letter of Request for Legal Assistance from the Deputy Prosecutor Gen. of Russian Federation, 235 F. 3d 1200, 1204 (CA9 2000)); see supra, at 4. A proceeding judicial in character, the Ninth Circuit further observed, was a likely sequel to the European Commission's investigation: "[The European Commission is] a body authorized to enforce the EC Treaty with written, binding decisions, enforceable through fines and penalties. [The Commission's] decisions are appealable to the Court of First Instance and then to the [European] Court of Justice. Thus, the proceeding for which discovery is sought is, at minimum, one leading to quasi-judicial proceedings." 292 F. 3d, at 667; see infra, at 9-11 (presenting synopsis of Commission proceedings and judicial review of Commission decisions).
We granted certiorari, 540 U. S. 1003 (2003), in view of the division among the Circuits on the question whether §1782(a) contains a foreign-discoverability requirement.7 We now hold that §1782(a) does not impose such a requirement. We also granted review on two other questions. First, does §1782(a) make discovery available to complainants, such as AMD, who do not have the status of private "litigants" and are not sovereign agents? See Pet. for Cert. (i). Second, must a "proceeding" before a foreign "tribunal" be "pending" or at least "imminent" for an applicant to invoke §1782(a) successfully? Compare In re Letter of Request from Crown Prosecution Serv. of United Kingdom, 870 F. 2d 686, 691 (CADC 1989) (proceeding must be "within reasonable contemplation"), with In re Ishihari Chemical Co., 251 F. 3d 120, 125 (CA2 2001) (proceeding must be "imminent--very likely to occur and very soon to occur"); In re International Judicial Assistance (Letter Rogatory) for Federative Republic of Brazil, 936 F. 2d 702, 706 (CA2 1991) (same). Answering "yes" to the first question and "no" to the second, we affirm the Ninth Circuit's judgment.
In short, we reject the view, expressed in In re Ishihara Chemical Co., that §1782 comes into play only when adjudicative proceedings are "pending" or "imminent." See 251 F. 3d, at 125 (proceeding must be "imminent--very likely to occur and very soon to occur" (internal quotation marks omitted)). Instead, we hold that §1782(a) requires only that a dispositive ruling by the Commission, reviewable by the European courts, be within reasonable contemplation. See Crown Prosecution Serv. of United Kingdom, 870 F. 2d, at 691; In re Request for Assistance from Ministry of Legal Affairs of Trinidad and Tobago, 848 F. 2d 1151, 1155, and n. 9 (CA11 1988); Smit, International Litigation 1026 ("It is not necessary ... for the [adjudicative] proceeding to be pending at the time the evidence is sought, but only that the evidence is eventually to be used in such a proceeding.").
We take up next the foreign-discoverability rule on which lower courts have divided: Does §1782(a) categorically bar a district court from ordering production of documents when the foreign tribunal or the "interested person" would not be able to obtain the documents if they were located in the foreign jurisdiction? See supra, at 8-9, and n. 7.
We note at the outset, and count it significant, that §1782(a) expressly shields privileged material: "A person may not be compelled to give his testimony or statement or to produce a document or other thing in violation of any legally applicable privilege." See S. Rep. No. 1580, at 9 ("[N]o person shall be required under the provisions of [§1782] to produce any evidence in violation of an applicable privilege."). Beyond shielding material safeguarded by an applicable privilege, however, nothing in the text of §1782 limits a district court's production-order authority to materials that could be discovered in the foreign jurisdiction if the materials were located there. "If Congress had intended to impose such a sweeping restriction on the district court's discretion, at a time when it was enacting liberalizing amendments to the statute, it would have included statutory language to that effect." In re Application of Gianoli Aldunate, 3 F. 3d 54, 59 (CA2 1993); accord Four Pillars Enterprises Co. v. Avery Dennison Corp., 308 F. 3d 1075, 1080 (CA9 2002); 292 F. 3d, at 669 (case below); In re Bayer AG, 146 F. 3d 188, 193-194 (CA3 1998).11
Intel raises two policy concerns in support of a foreign-discoverability limitation on §1782(a) aid--avoiding offense to foreign governments, and maintaining parity between litigants. Brief for Petitioner 23-24; Reply Brief 5, 13-14; see In re Application of Asta Medica, S. A., 981 F. 2d 1, 6 (CA1 1992) ("Congress did not seek to place itself on a collision course with foreign tribunals and legislatures, which have carefully chosen the procedures and laws best suited to their concepts of litigation."). While comity and parity concerns may be important as touchstones for a district court's exercise of discretion in particular cases, they do not permit our insertion of a generally applicable foreign-discoverability rule into the text of §1782(a).
Concerns about maintaining parity among adversaries in litigation likewise do not provide a sound basis for a cross-the-board foreign-discoverability rule. When information is sought by an "interested person," a district court could condition relief upon that person's reciprocal exchange of information. See Euromepa, S. A. v. R. Esmerian, Inc., 51 F. 3d 1095, 1102 (CA2 1995); Smit, Recent Developments 237. Moreover, the foreign tribunal can place conditions on its acceptance of the information to maintain whatever measure of parity it concludes is appropriate. See Euromepa, 51 F. 3d, at 1101.14
As earlier emphasized, see supra, at 17, a district court is not required to grant a §1782(a) discovery application simply because it has the authority to do so. See United Kingdom v. United States, 238 F. 3d 1312, 1319 (CA11 2001) ("a district court's compliance with a §1782 request is not mandatory"). We note below factors that bear consideration in ruling on a §1782(a) request.
Second, as the 1964 Senate Report suggests, a court presented with a §1782(a) request may take into account the nature of the foreign tribunal, the character of the proceedings underway abroad, and the receptivity of the foreign government or the court or agency abroad to U. S. federal-court judicial assistance. See S. Rep. No. 1580, at 7. Further, the grounds Intel urged for categorical limitations on §1782(a)'s scope may be relevant in determining whether a discovery order should be granted in a particular case. See Brief for United States as Amicus Curiae 23. Specifically, a district court could consider whether the §1782(a) request conceals an attempt to circumvent foreign proof-gathering restrictions or other policies of a foreign country or the United States. See id., at 27. Also, unduly intrusive or burdensome requests may be rejected or trimmed. See Bayer, 146 F. 3d, at 196 (remanding for district-court consideration of "appropriate measures, if needed, to protect the confidentiality of materials"); In re Application of Esses, 101 F. 3d 873, 876 (CA2 1996) (affirming limited discovery that is neither "burdensome [n]or duplicative").
Second, a court should not permit discovery where both of the following are true: (1) A private person seeking discovery would not be entitled to that discovery under foreign law, and (2) the discovery would not be available under domestic law in analogous circumstances. The Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, for example, make only limited provisions for nonlitigants to obtain certain discovery. See Fed. Rule Civ. Proc. 27. The limitations contained in the Rules help to avoid discovery battles launched by firms simply seeking information from competitors. Where there is benefit in permitting such discovery, and the benefit outweighs the cost of allowing it, one would expect either domestic law or foreign law to authorize it. If, notwithstanding the fact that it would not be allowed under either domestic or foreign law, there is some special need for the discovery in a particular instance, one would expect to find foreign governmental or intergovernmental authorities making the case for that need. Where none of these circumstances is present, what benefit could offset the obvious costs to the competitor and to our courts? I cannot think of any.
What is the legal source of these limiting principles? In my view, they, and perhaps others, are implicit in the statute itself, given its purpose and use of the terms "tribunal" and "interested person." §1782(a). But even if they are not, this Court's "supervisory powers . . . permit, at the least, the promulgation of procedural rules governing the management of litigation," not to mention " 'procedures deemed desirable from the viewpoint of sound judicial practice although in nowise commanded by statute or by the Constitution.' " Thomas v. Arn, 474 U. S. 140, 146-147 (1985) (quoting Cupp v. Naughten, 414 U. S. 141, 146 (1973)). See also Dickerson v. United States, 530 U. S. 428, 437 (2000) ("This Court has supervisory authority over the federal courts, and we may use that authority to prescribe rules of evidence and procedure that are binding in those tribunals"). Intel Corp. has asked us to exercise those powers in this case. Brief for Petitioner 34-38. We should do so along the lines that I suggest; consequently, we should reverse the judgment below and order the complaint in this case dismissed.
FOOTNOTESFootnote 1 "[A] letter rogatory is the request by a domestic court to a foreign court to take evidence from a certain witness." Jones, International Judicial Assistance: Procedural Chaos and a Program for Reform, 62 Yale L. J. 515, 519 (1953). See Smit, International Litigation under the United States Code, 65 Colum. L. Rev. 1015, 1027 (1965) (hereinafter Smit, International Litigation) (noting foreign courts' use of letters rogatory to request evidence-gathering aid from United States courts).
Footnote 2 The Rules Commission also drafted amendments to the Federal Rules of Civil and Criminal Procedure and a Uniform Interstate and International Procedure Act, recommended for adoption by individual States. See Fourth Annual Report of the Commission on International Rules of Judicial Procedure, H. R. Doc. No. 88, 88th Cong., 1st Sess., 2 (1963).
Footnote 3 See Smit, International Litigation 1026-1027, n. 72 (commenting that Congress eliminated the word "pending" in order "to facilitate the gathering of evidence prior to the institution of litigation abroad").
Footnote 4 The Alabama federal court granted summary judgment in Intel's favor in the Intergraph litigation, and the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit affirmed. See 253 F. 3d, at 699. A protective order, imposed by the Alabama federal court, governs the confidentiality of all discovery in that case. App. 72-73.
Footnote 5 Both Intel and AMD are headquartered in the Northern District of California. Id., at 113.
Footnote 6 AMD's complaint to the Commission alleges, inter alia, "that Intel has monopolized the worldwide market for Windows-capable i.e. x86, microprocessors." Id., at 55-56. The documents from the Intergraph litigation relate to: "(a) the market within which Intel x86 microprocessors compete; (b) the power that Intel enjoys within that market; (c) actions taken by Intel to preserve and enhance its position in the market; and (d) the impact of the actions taken by Intel to preserve and enhance its market position." App. 55.
Footnote 7 The First and Eleventh Circuits have construed §1782(a) to contain a foreign-discoverability requirement. See In re Application of Asta Medica, S. A., 981 F. 2d 1, 7 (CA1 1992); In re Request for Assistance from Ministry of Legal Affairs of Trinidad and Tobago, 848 F. 2d 1151, 1156 (CA11 1988). The Fourth and Fifth Circuits have held that no such requirement exists if the §1782(a) applicant is a foreign sovereign. See In re Letter of Request from Amtsgericht Ingolstadt, F. R. G., 82 F. 3d 590, 592 (CA4 1996); In re Letter Rogatory from First Court of First Instance in Civil Matters, Caracas, Venezuela, 42 F. 3d 308, 310-311 (CA5 1995). In alignment with the Ninth Circuit, the Second and Third Circuits have rejected a foreign-discoverability requirement. See In re Application of Gianoli Aldunate, 3 F. 3d 54, 59-60 (CA2 1993); In re Bayer AG, 146 F. 3d 188, 193-194 (CA3 1998).
Footnote 8 The Court of First Instance, which is "attached to the [European] Court of Justice," was established "to improve the judicial protection of individual interests, particularly in cases requiring the examination of complex facts, whilst at the same time reducing the workload of the [European] Court of Justice." C. Kerse, E. C. Antitrust Procedure 37 (3d ed. 1994).
Footnote 9 The dissent suggests that the Commission "more closely resembles a prosecuting authority, say, the Department of Justice's Antitrust Division, than an administrative agency that adjudicates cases, say, the Federal Trade Commission." Post, at 4. That is a questionable suggestion in view of the European Commission's authority to determine liability and impose penalties, dispositions that will remain final unless overturned by the European courts. See supra, at 10.
Footnote 10 The term "interested person," Intel notes, also appears in 28 U. S. C. §1696(a), a provision enacted concurrently with the 1964 revision of §1782. Brief for Petitioner 27. Section 1696(a) authorizes federal district courts to "order service ... of any document issued in connection with a [foreign] proceeding" pursuant to a request made by the foreign tribunal "or upon application of any interested person." Intel reasons that "[t]he class of private parties qualifying as 'interested persons' for [service] purposes must of course be limited to litigants, because private parties ... cannot serve 'process' unless they have filed suit." Ibid. (emphasis in original). Section 1696(a), however, is not limited to service of process; it allows service of "any document" issued in connection with a foreign proceeding. As the Government points out by way of example: "[I]f the European Commission's procedures were revised to require a complainant to serve its complaint on a target company, but the complainant's role in the Commission's proceedings otherwise remained unchanged, [§]1696 would authorize the district court to provide that 'interested [person]' with assistance in serving that document." Brief for United States as Amicus Curiae 20, n. 11.
Footnote 11 Section §1782(a) instructs that a district court's discovery order "may prescribe the practice and procedure, which may be in whole or part the practice and procedure of the foreign country or the international tribunal, for taking the testimony or statement or producing the document or other thing ... [or may be] the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure." This mode-of-proof-taking instruction imposes no substantive limitation on the discovery to be had.
Footnote 12 Most civil-law systems lack procedures analogous to the pretrial discovery regime operative under the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. See ALI, ALI/Unidroit Principles and Rules of Transnational Civil Procedure, Proposed Final Draft, Rule 22, Comment R-22E (2004) ("Disclosure and exchange of evidence under the civil-law systems are generally more restricted, or nonexistent."); Hazard, Discovery and the Role of the Judge in Civil Law Jurisdictions, 73 Notre Dame L. Rev. 1017, 1018-1019 (1998) (same). See also Smit, Recent Developments 235, n. 93 ("The drafters [of §1782] were quite aware of the circumstance that civil law systems generally do not have American type pretrial discovery, and do not compel the production of documentary evidence.").
Footnote 13 See Smit, American Assistance to Litigation in Foreign and International Tribunals: Section 1782 of Title 28 of the U. S. C. Revisited, 25 Syracuse J. Int'l L. & Comm. 1, 13, and n. 63 (1998) (hereinafter Smit, American Assistance) (noting that "[a] similar decision was rendered by the President of the Amsterdam District Court").
Footnote 14 A civil-law court, furthermore, might attend to litigant-parity concerns in its merits determination: "In civil law countries, documentary evidence is generally submitted as an attachment to the pleadings or as part of a report by an expert... . A civil law court generally rules upon the question of whether particular documentary evidence may be relied upon only in its decision on the merits." Smit, Recent Developments 235-236, n. 94.
Footnote 15 Among its proposed rules, the dissent would exclude from §1782(a)'s reach discovery not available "under foreign law" and "under domestic law in analogous circumstances." Post, at 3. Because comparison of systems is slippery business, the dissent's rule is infinitely easier to state than to apply. As the dissent's examples tellingly reveal, see post, at 1-2, a foreign proceeding may have no direct analogue in our legal system. In light of the variety of foreign proceedings resistant to ready classification in domestic terms, Congress left unbounded by categorical rules the determination whether a matter is proceeding "in a foreign or international tribunal." While we reject the rules the dissent would inject into the statute, see post, at 3-6, we do suggest guides for the exercise of district-court discretion, see infra, at 20-23.
Footnote 16 At oral argument, counsel for AMD observed: "In the United States, we could have brought a private action in the district court for these very same violations. In Europe, our only Europe-wide remedy was to go to the [European Commission]." Tr. of Oral Arg. 33. Footnote 17 The dissent sees a need for "categorical limits" to ward off "expensive, time-consuming battles about discovery." Post, at 2. That concern seems more imaginary than real. There is no evidence whatsoever, in the 40 years since §1782(a)'s adoption, see supra, at 3-4, of the costs, delays, and forced settlements the dissent hypothesizes. See Smit, American Assistance 1, 19-20 ("The revised section 1782 ... has been applied in scores of cases... . All in all, Section 1782 has largely served the purposes for which it was enacted... . [T]here appears to be no reason for seriously considering, at this time, any statutory amendments.").
Footnote 18 The European Commission's "Leniency Program" allows "cartel participants [to] confess their own wrongdoing" in return for prosecutorial leniency. European Commission Amicus Curiae 14-15; Brief for European Commission as Amicus Curiae in Support of Pet. for Cert. 6.
Footnote 19 The District Court might also consider the significance of the protective order entered by the District Court for the Northern District of Alabama. See App. 73; supra, at 6, n. 4; cf. Four Pillars Enterprises Co. v. Avery Dennison Corp., 308 F. 3d 1075, 1080 (CA9 2002) (affirming district-court denial of discovery that "would frustrate the protective order of [another] federal [district] court").
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