Court Opinion

ID: 9403715
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-06-21 16:01:18.015143+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:20:08.762111
License: Public Domain

USCA11 Case: 22-10214   Document: 43-1    Date Filed: 06/21/2023   Page: 1 of 36

                                                          [PUBLISH]
                                 In the
                 United States Court of Appeals
                        For the Eleventh Circuit

                          ____________________

                               No. 22-10214
                          ____________________

        NUVASIVE, INC.,
                                Plaintiﬀ-Counter Defendant-Appellee,
        versus
        ABSOLUTE MEDICAL, LLC,
        GREG SOUFLERIS,
        DAVE HAWLEY,
        ABSOLUTE MEDICAL SYSTEMS, LLC,
        RYAN MILLER,

                                               Defendants-Appellants,

                          ____________________
USCA11 Case: 22-10214        Document: 43-1        Date Filed: 06/21/2023       Page: 2 of 36

        2                        Opinion of the Court                     22-10214

                    Appeal from the United States District Court
                         for the Middle District of Florida
                     D.C. Docket No. 6:17-cv-02206-CEM-GJK
                             ____________________

        Before WILSON and JILL PRYOR, Circuit Judges, and RUIZ,*
        District Judge.
        JILL PRYOR, Circuit Judge:
                NuVasive, Inc. manufactures medical products and equip-
        ment to treat spinal disease. In central Florida, NuVasive sold its
        products through an exclusive distribution agreement with Abso-
        lute Medical, LLC, a company owned by Greg Soufleris. Under the
        agreement, Absolute Medical employed independent-contractor
        sales representatives who marketed and sold NuVasive’s products
        to doctors and medical practices in the region. Long before the end
        of the agreement’s term, Soufleris informed NuVasive that he was
        dissolving Absolute Medical and ending its business relationship
        with NuVasive. He started a new company, Absolute Medical Sys-
        tems, LLC (“AMS”), which began selling products for one of NuVa-
        sive’s competitors.
              NuVasive sued Absolute Medical, Soufleris, AMS, and two
        of Absolute Medical’s sales representatives who began working for
        AMS, Dave Hawley and Ryan Miller, for breaching the exclusive

        * Honorable Rodolfo A. Ruiz II, United States District Judge for the Southern
        District of Florida, sitting by designation.
USCA11 Case: 22-10214         Document: 43-1        Date Filed: 06/21/2023         Page: 3 of 36

        22-10214                  Opinion of the Court                                3

        distribution agreement and the included noncompetition agree-
        ments. After two years of litigation, the district court enforced a
        dispute resolution clause in the agreement, ordering NuVasive and
        Absolute Medical to arbitrate NuVasive’s breach-of-contract claim
        seeking money damages. The district court stayed most of the
        other claims during the arbitration. The arbitration panel’s final
        award found Absolute Medical liable for breaching the agreement
        but denied NuVasive’s claims for lost profits damages.
                Following arbitration, the litigation resumed to resolve
        NuVasive’s remaining claims.1 In discovery, Absolute Medical pro-
        duced text messages that Soufleris had sent to Hawley while Haw-
        ley testified before the arbitration panel. The text messages con-
        cerned the subject matter of Hawley’s testimony, and his testi-
        mony on cross-examination appeared to be consistent with an-
        swers suggested in Soufleris’s contemporaneous texts. Based on
        this new information, NuVasive moved the district court to vacate
        the arbitration panel’s award under 9 U.S.C. § 10(a)(1) on the
        ground that the award had been procured by fraud. Absolute Med-
        ical objected that NuVasive filed the motion to vacate after the

        1 While the arbitration was pending, NuVasive moved for summary judgment
        on its breach-of-contract claim against Absolute Medical that sought injunc-
        tive relief (Count I), the breach-of-contract claim against AMS (Count III), and
        the breach-of-contract claim against Hawley and Miller (Count IV). Hawley,
        Miller, and AMS moved for summary judgment on the breach-of-contract
        claim against Hawley and Miller and the conversion claim against Hawley and
        AMS (Count V).
USCA11 Case: 22-10214      Document: 43-1      Date Filed: 06/21/2023     Page: 4 of 36

        4                      Opinion of the Court                 22-10214

        statutory three-month deadline, but the district court tolled the
        deadline and ultimately vacated the arbitration panel’s award.
               Absolute Medical, Soufleris, AMS, and the sales representa-
        tives now appeal the district court’s order granting NuVasive’s mo-
        tion to vacate the arbitration panel’s final award. After careful re-
        view, and with the benefit of oral argument, we affirm.
                                 I. BACKGROUND
        A.    NuVasive and Absolute Medical’s Business Relation-
              ship
               NuVasive is a medical device manufacturer that designs, de-
        velops, and markets products for the surgical treatment of spinal
        disorders. Absolute Medical, owned by Soufleris, employed inde-
        pendent contractors to act as sales representatives to market and
        sell NuVasive’s products to hospitals and doctors.
                Around 2005, Absolute Medical began working with NuVa-
        sive to market and sell NuVasive’s products in central Florida. By
        2013, NuVasive and Absolute Medical had entered into an exclu-
        sive distribution arrangement in which Absolute Medical and its
        sales representatives would be the sole marketers, distributors, and
        sellers of NuVasive’s products in a defined territory in Florida that
        included specific counties as well as certain hospitals in other coun-
        ties.
               This appeal concerns the contract NuVasive and Absolute
        Medical inked in 2017, when they agreed to extend their exclusive
        distribution relationship “after many months of negotiation[].”
USCA11 Case: 22-10214         Document: 43-1        Date Filed: 06/21/2023        Page: 5 of 36

        22-10214                  Opinion of the Court                              5

        Doc. 1 at 4. 2 This contract, entitled “Exclusive Sales Representative
        Agreement” (the “Agreement”), had a term of five years beginning
        on January 1, 2017. Like the earlier agreement, it appointed Abso-
        lute Medical and its sales representatives as the exclusive sellers of
        NuVasive’s products in the defined territory. In section 5.09(c) of
        the Agreement, Absolute Medical promised that during the Agree-
        ment’s five-year term and for one year afterward, Absolute Medi-
        cal’s sales representatives would not “represent, promote, sell, so-
        licit, or otherwise commercialize . . . any products or services that
        [we]re, in NuVasive’s reasonable judgment, competitive with any
        of NuVasive’s products or services.” Doc. 260-3 at 137. Absolute
        Medical further agreed that, during the same period, its sales rep-
        resentatives would not “solicit, encourage, or induce, or cause to
        be solicited, encouraged or induced” any current, former, or pro-
        spective NuVasive customers “to terminate or adversely modify
        any business relationship with NuVasive.” Id. In exchange, NuVa-
        sive agreed to provide Absolute Medical’s sales representatives
        with “extraordinary, specialized, comprehensive, and industry-
        leading training” on NuVasive’s products, which would give the
        sales representatives “a deep understanding of NuVasive’s prod-
        ucts, methodology, trade secrets, and other valuable confidential
        or proprietary information.” Doc. 188 ¶ 30.
               To effect section 5.09(c)’s non-competition and non-solicita-
        tion provisions, section 5.09(e) of the Agreement required Absolute

        2 “Doc.” refers to the docket entries in No. 6:17-cv-02206 (M.D. Fla.).
USCA11 Case: 22-10214      Document: 43-1     Date Filed: 06/21/2023     Page: 6 of 36

        6                      Opinion of the Court                22-10214

        Medical to cause each of its “Representative Affiliate[s]”—in Abso-
        lute Medical’s case, its sales representatives—to sign compliance
        agreements. The compliance agreements incorporated section
        5.09(c) of the Agreement. To comply with section 5.09(e), Absolute
        Medical agreed to have its sales representatives, including Hawley
        and Miller, sign compliance agreements.
                Less than one year into the Agreement’s five-year term, Sou-
        fleris informed NuVasive by email of his “resignation” from the
        Agreement because “[his] time [had] come to move on.” Doc. 188-
        4. Just three days later, Soufleris formed AMS. After a week, the
        Absolute Medical sales representatives who sold NuVasive prod-
        ucts resigned. According to NuVasive, the sales representatives
        then began working for AMS soliciting business from, and perform-
        ing services for, the same customers they serviced for NuVasive,
        but on behalf of a different manufacturer, Alphatec, which pro-
        duced competing products. NuVasive believed that with this con-
        duct, Absolute Medical was violating the Agreement by not enforc-
        ing the compliance agreements that it was supposed to have had
        the representatives sign, and that the sales representatives were vi-
        olating the compliance agreements by working for Alphatec
        through AMS.
USCA11 Case: 22-10214        Document: 43-1       Date Filed: 06/21/2023       Page: 7 of 36

        22-10214                 Opinion of the Court                             7

        B.     NuVasive’s Lawsuit
               NuVasive filed a federal lawsuit against Absolute Medical,
        Soufleris, Hawley, Miller, and AMS. 3 NuVasive’s complaint al-
        leged nine counts against the various defendants: (I) breach of con-
        tract against Absolute Medical seeking injunctive relief; (II) breach
        of contract against Absolute Medical seeking damages through an
        arbitration proceeding; (III) breach of contract for injunctive relief
        and damages against AMS; (IV) breach of contract for injunctive
        relief and damages against Hawley and Miller; (V) conversion
        against Hawley and AMS for sharing a NuVasive product with
        competitor Alphatec; (VI) breach of fiduciary duty of loyalty
        against Soufleris under Florida’s Limited Liability Company Act;
        (VII) piercing the corporate veil to hold Soufleris liable for actions
        of Absolute Medical and AMS; (VIII) violation of the Florida De-
        ceptive and Unfair Trade Practices Act against all defendants; and
        (IX) tortious interference with contract against Soufleris for inter-
        ference with NuVasive’s relationship with surgeon customers.
              The operative complaint alleged the following. Absolute
        Medical’s sales representatives—including Hawley and Miller—
        were “soliciting business from, and performing services for, the
        same customers they solicited business and performed services on
        NuVasive’s behalf.” Doc. 188 ¶ 54. “The only difference” was that
        they had started “sell[ing] products marketed by Alphatec on behalf

        3 The initial complaint named as defendants Absolute Medical, Soufleris, and
        Hawley. The first amended complaint added as defendants AMS and Miller.
        NuVasive’s second amended complaint is the operative pleading.
USCA11 Case: 22-10214      Document: 43-1      Date Filed: 06/21/2023     Page: 8 of 36

        8                      Opinion of the Court                 22-10214

        of AMS.” Id. Less than a week after AMS was formed, Soufleris and
        Miller dined with one of Absolute Medical’s surgeon customers
        who had previously purchased NuVasive products and asked the
        surgeon to try Alphatec’s products. During the same month, Haw-
        ley sent a message to Alphatec “regarding custom instruments
        needed by a surgeon” to whom he had previously sold NuVasive
        products. Id. ¶ 6. The email provided precise descriptions of the in-
        struments. Hawley also promised to send samples of the custom
        instruments NuVasive had made for the surgeon so that Alphatec
        could create similar ones. NuVasive later discovered, in a Florida
        hospital, custom instruments NuVasive had made for the surgeon,
        which were sterilized and prepared for a surgery involving non-
        NuVasive products, without NuVasive’s knowledge. Soufleris,
        Hawley, and Miller continued to use the same telephone numbers
        and work email addresses that they had used while working with
        Absolute Medical to sell NuVasive products—even though they
        purported to work for AMS, a different company.
        C.     Litigation Stayed for Arbitration of NuVasive’s
               Breach-of-Contract Damages Claim Against Abso-
               lute Medical
               NuVasive’s breach-of-contract claim seeking damages
        against Absolute Medical (Count II) alleged that Absolute Medical
        breached the Agreement by attempting to terminate the agree-
        ment, failing to enforce its sales representatives’ compliance agree-
        ments, falsely representing that its sales representatives had not ex-
        ecuted compliance agreements, soliciting business for Alphatec,
        and converting NuVasive’s business into business for Alphatec.
USCA11 Case: 22-10214       Document: 43-1       Date Filed: 06/21/2023      Page: 9 of 36

        22-10214                Opinion of the Court                            9

        NuVasive alleged that Absolute Medical’s breaches caused it “sig-
        nificant damages.” Id. ¶ 79.
               NuVasive moved to compel arbitration of the claim in
        Count II under the Agreement’s binding arbitration clause. The dis-
        trict court granted the motion to compel arbitration of Count II
        and ordered that litigation on most of the remaining claims be
        stayed pending the arbitration. 4
                NuVasive moved for summary judgment in the arbitration
        proceeding. The arbitration panel concluded that Absolute Medical
        breached multiple sections of the Agreement by failing to have its
        sales representatives sign the required compliance agreements, fail-
        ing to inform NuVasive that Alphatec was pursuing sales in the re-
        gion, and failing to perform its marketing and sales obligations. The
        panel declined to grant summary judgment, however, because
        “NuVasive [was] still required to establish causation and damages
        in order to prevail” on the claim. Doc. 283-1 at 6.
              NuVasive and Absolute Medical arbitrated the causation and
        damages elements of the claim before the panel via videoconfer-
        ence in December 2020. On March 4, 2021, the arbitration panel
        entered a Final Award denying NuVasive’s breach of contract claim
        because NuVasive had failed to prove loss causation connecting
        Absolute Medical’s conduct with NuVasive’s claimed lost-profit
        damages. The panel’s conclusion was based in part on its finding

        4 The stayed claims included Count III’s claim for monetary damages, Count
        VI, VII, VIII, and IX.
USCA11 Case: 22-10214      Document: 43-1      Date Filed: 06/21/2023     Page: 10 of 36

        10                     Opinion of the Court                  22-10214

        that NuVasive’s causation evidence did not adequately account for
        several surgeon customers’ “variety of personal circumstances”
        that led them to switch from NuVasive’s products to products sold
        by other vendors, including Alphatec. Doc. 283-2 at 11. Therefore,
        NuVasive’s lost-profits damages model failed to capture accurately
        how the breaches affected its profits. The panel found that some of
        the surgeon customers—who had no contractual obligation to use
        any particular vendor—had used Alphatec products prior to Abso-
        lute Medical’s breach of the Agreement; other surgeons continued
        to use NuVasive products after the breach; and still other surgeons
        said they stopped using NuVasive products due to a “variety of fac-
        tors,” id. at 10, including a transition to robotic surgery in one in-
        stance, and personal skepticism about NuVasive’s business deci-
        sions, such as its removal of its Chief Executive Officer.
        D.     NuVasive’s Motion to Vacate the Final Award
                After the arbitration panel issued the Final Award, NuVasive
        and the defendants returned to district court to prepare the previ-
        ously stayed claims for trial. The district court permitted a brief pe-
        riod of limited discovery on the remaining claims. During the dis-
        covery period, NuVasive served the defendants with requests for
        production of documents. Dissatisfied with the defendants’ re-
        sponses, NuVasive filed a motion to compel better responses. The
        district court granted the motion in part, ordering Soufleris and
        AMS to produce most of the documents NuVasive had requested,
        no later than August 26, 2021. Instead of producing the documents,
        the defendants moved for reconsideration of the order. The district
        court denied reconsideration.
USCA11 Case: 22-10214     Document: 43-1      Date Filed: 06/21/2023    Page: 11 of 36

        22-10214               Opinion of the Court                       11

                Soufleris and AMS did not produce the documents until No-
        vember 4, well after the court’s August deadline had passed. Six
        days after the production, Absolute Medical and AMS moved to
        confirm the Final Award. In the motion to confirm the arbitration
        award, they informed the district court that they “expect[ed]”
        NuVasive to “argue for the first time that there was some level of
        misconduct during the underlying arbitration that did not come to
        the attention of the arbitration panel, and that this alleged miscon-
        duct provides a basis for challenging the Final Award.” Doc. 333 at
        7. Anticipating NuVasive’s arguments, they told the district court
        that “it seem[ed] clear that what NuVasive intend[ed] [wa]s an at-
        tack upon the validity of the Final Award notwithstanding NuVa-
        sive’s conscious decision not to timely register an objection to con-
        firmation of the award.” Id. They argued that the court should re-
        ject NuVasive’s attempt to pursue vacatur because it was too late.
        On November 15, as predicted, NuVasive moved for leave to file a
        motion to vacate the Final Award based on the defendants’ miscon-
        duct reflected in text messages the defendants had just produced.
        On November 17, the district court granted leave to file the mo-
        tion.
               In its motion to vacate the Final Award, filed on November
        22, NuVasive argued that Absolute Medical “procured” the Final
        Award through “corruption, fraud or undue means,” and thus the
        award should be vacated under § 10 of the Federal Arbitration Act
        (“FAA”). 9 U.S.C. § 10(a)(1). Recognizing that the FAA requires any
        party seeking to vacate an arbitration award under § 10 to file its
        motion within three months of the panel’s award, see 9 U.S.C. § 12,
USCA11 Case: 22-10214     Document: 43-1      Date Filed: 06/21/2023     Page: 12 of 36

        12                     Opinion of the Court                 22-10214

        NuVasive’s motion requested that the district court grant relief in
        two respects.
              First, NuVasive asked the district court to equitably toll the
        three-month statutory filing deadline and consider its otherwise
        overdue motion. It argued that, even though this Court had not
        previously applied equitable tolling to the FAA, the district court
        should conclude that it was available and apply it in its case because
        of Soufleris’s and AMS’s misconduct.
                Second, the motion argued that the Final Award should be
        vacated. NuVasive alleged that Soufleris had instructed sales repre-
        sentative Hawley “on how to answer questions NuVasive asked
        Hawley during the Arbitration as Hawley testified” remotely via
        videoconference. Doc. 353 at 2. NuVasive argued that it “did not
        know—and had no way of knowing—of Defendant’s malfeasance
        in the Arbitration” until Soufleris and AMS provided the text mes-
        sage thread in their November production. Id. NuVasive explained
        that Soufleris was physically present in his counsel’s Atlanta, Geor-
        gia office, at least for his own testimony by videoconference, on
        December 16, 2020. Hawley was physically present in Orlando,
        Florida when he testified later the same day. As a party to the arbi-
        tration proceeding, Soufleris was permitted to observe Hawley’s
        video testimony, which he did from his counsel’s office. But Sou-
        fleris was not merely observing the testimony, according to NuVa-
        sive. NuVasive maintained that by comparing the time stamps on
        the text messages the defendants produced in discovery with Haw-
        ley’s arbitration testimony, it could demonstrate that Soufleris was
USCA11 Case: 22-10214        Document: 43-1        Date Filed: 06/21/2023        Page: 13 of 36

        22-10214                  Opinion of the Court                              13

        instructing Hawley in real-time on how to answer the questions
        posed to him by NuVasive’s counsel. Hawley’s testimony demon-
        strated “that he followed Soufleris’ directions on how to answer
        these questions.” Id. at 10. As an example, NuVasive’s counsel
        questioned Hawley about compliance agreements he was required
        to sign pursuant to NuVasive’s and Absolute Medical’s 2017 Agree-
        ment and the companies’ prior exclusive distribution agreements.
        NuVasive pointed out that Hawley answered “yes” when asked if
        “[he] signed numerous noncompetes with Absolute Medical.” Id.
        at 5–6. After Hawley received a text message from Soufleris saying,
        “it was your corporate entity,” id. at 5, he changed his testimony to
        say that he had signed the compliance agreements on behalf of his
        corporate entity, which was not a defendant in the lawsuit. Id. at
        5–6. 5 NuVasive offered numerous other examples.
              The defendants opposed the motion. They argued that
        NuVasive’s motion to vacate the Final Award—filed on Novem-
        ber 22—should be denied because it was filed more than three
        months after the Final Award was issued, outside of the time al-
        lowed by the FAA. See 9 U.S.C. § 12. Further, they asserted that

        5 Soufleris’s text message stating “[i]t was your corporate entity” was sent at
        6:24 p.m. Doc. 353 at 5. At 6:25 p.m., Hawley testified that he signed the com-
        pliance agreements not individually but on behalf of his company:
                 Q:      In fact, you signed numerous noncompetes with Absolute
                         Medical, correct?
                 A:      Over the years, yes.
                 Q:      Now, I want to go back - -
                 A:      On behalf of Hawley Med.
        Id. at 5–6.
USCA11 Case: 22-10214     Document: 43-1      Date Filed: 06/21/2023    Page: 14 of 36

        14                     Opinion of the Court                22-10214

        equitable tolling was not available in the FAA context, so NuVasive
        could not seek leave to file its motion after the statutory deadline.
        In the defendants’ view, although equitable tolling of a statute of
        limitations may sometimes be available, to apply it in this case
        would have contravened this Court’s “strict” adherence to the
        FAA’s provisions. Doc. 360 at 4. And with respect to NuVasive’s
        allegations of misconduct, the defendants provided a declaration
        from Hawley in which he attested that he “was not aware that Mr.
        Soufleris was texting [him] during the course of [his] testimony and
        did not review or utilize the text messages from Mr. Soufleris prior
        to answering questions during the Arbitration.” Doc. 360-3 at 4. It
        is undisputed that neither Soufleris nor Hawley disclosed—at any
        time—that Soufleris sent Hawley text messages at the time of his
        arbitration testimony.
                The district court granted NuVasive’s motion to vacate the
        Final Award. The court first considered whether NuVasive’s mo-
        tion was timely. It rejected the defendants’ argument that equitable
        tolling is not available under FAA. While the district court ob-
        served that this Court had not yet addressed whether the FAA’s
        time limitations may be equitably tolled, it adopted the Ninth Cir-
        cuit’s reasoning in Move, Inc. v. Citigroup Global Markets, 840 F.3d
        1152 (9th Cir. 2016), and held that equitable tolling could be avail-
        able when the circumstances warranted such an “extraordinary
        remedy.” Doc. 371 at 10 (quoting Brown v. Barrow, 512 F.3d 1304,
        1307 (11th Cir. 2008)). The district court then concluded that equi-
        table tolling was appropriate in this case because NuVasive demon-
        strated that the defendants’ conduct amounted to extraordinary
USCA11 Case: 22-10214     Document: 43-1      Date Filed: 06/21/2023     Page: 15 of 36

        22-10214               Opinion of the Court                        15

        circumstances. Further, NuVasive “was diligently pursuing its
        rights at every step following issuance of the Final Award” because
        the text messages showing misconduct were not shared before the
        November 4 production, and as soon as it learned about them, it
        quickly took appropriate action. Doc. 371 at 12–13. Thus, the dis-
        trict court concluded that the application of equitable tolling was
        appropriate, and NuVasive’s motion to vacate was timely because
        of that tolling.
                Having concluded that the motion to vacate was timely, the
        district court considered the motion’s merits. The district court re-
        lied on our three-part test to determine whether an arbitration
        award should be vacated due to fraud, articulated in Bonar v. Dean
        Witter Reynolds, 835 F.2d 1378 (11th Cir. 1988). The test requires
        that (1) “the movant must establish the fraud by clear and convinc-
        ing evidence,” (2) “the fraud must not have been discoverable upon
        the exercise of due diligence prior to or during the arbitration,” and
        (3) “the person seeking to vacate the award must demonstrate that
        the fraud materially related to an issue in the arbitration.” Id. at
        1383.
              The district court set out a detailed chronology comparing
        Soufleris’s text messages to Hawley with Hawley’s arbitration tes-
        timony. It granted the motion, concluding that the Final Award
        must be vacated. The district court reasoned that “all of Hawley’s
        testimony directly align[ed] in time and subject-matter with the
        messages being sent by Soufleris, and Hawley’s testimony [was] al-
        ways consistent with Soufleris’ messages.” Doc. 371 at 15. Based on
USCA11 Case: 22-10214      Document: 43-1      Date Filed: 06/21/2023     Page: 16 of 36

        16                     Opinion of the Court                  22-10214

        the chronology, the district court concluded that NuVasive had sat-
        isfied the three-part test by demonstrating the defendants’ fraud,
        showing that it could not have discovered the fraud before or dur-
        ing the November 4 production, and that Hawley’s coached testi-
        mony was material to an issue before the arbitration panel. The
        district court’s order also denied the defendants’ request to remand
        the case to the arbitration panel for rehearing or a determination
        of how Hawley’s messages affected the Final Award.
               The defendants timely appealed the district court’s order
        granting NuVasive’s motion to vacate the Final Award.
                            II. STANDARD OF REVIEW
               “[T]he question of whether equitable tolling applies is a legal
        one subject to de novo review.” Booth v. Carnival Corp., 522 F.3d
        1148, 1149 (11th Cir. 2008) (internal quotation marks omitted).
        “[T]he application of that law to the particular facts is reviewed for
        abuse of discretion.” Bhd. of Locomotive Eng’rs & Trainmen Gen.
        Comm. of Adjustment CSX Transp. N. Lines v. CSX Transp., Inc.,
        522 F.3d 1190, 1194 (11th Cir. 2008). “There is an abuse of discre-
        tion when a district judge bases his or her decision on factual find-
        ings that are clearly erroneous.” Id.
               “[O]rders vacating arbitration awards, like orders confirm-
        ing them, are to be reviewed for clear error with respect to factual
        findings and de novo with respect to the district court’s legal conclu-
        sions.” Gianelli Money Purchase Plan & Tr. v. ADM Inv’r. Servs., Inc.,
        146 F.3d 1309, 1311 (11th Cir. 1998).
USCA11 Case: 22-10214     Document: 43-1      Date Filed: 06/21/2023     Page: 17 of 36

        22-10214               Opinion of the Court                        17

                                   III. DISCUSSION
                There are four issues on appeal. The first two concern the
        district court’s application of equitable tolling to NuVasive’s mo-
        tion to vacate the Final Award. The latter two address the district
        court’s decision to vacate the award.
                First, the defendants argue that the district court erred when
        it concluded that the three-month deadline for seeking vacatur of
        the arbitration award may be equitably tolled. Second, they argue
        that even if the FAA’s three-month deadline for moving to vacate
        an award may be equitably tolled in appropriate circumstances, the
        district court abused its discretion by tolling the deadline and find-
        ing NuVasive’s motion timely in this case.
               Third, the defendants maintain that the district court erred
        by granting the motion to vacate the arbitration award. Fourth,
        they argue that the district court abused its discretion when, after
        vacating the Final Award, the court denied their request to remand
        the case back to the arbitration panel. Below we address each issue
        in turn.
        A.     The District Court Did Not Err by Equitably Tolling
               the Three-Month Filing Deadline and Considering
               NuVasive’s Motion as Timely.
                The defendants first contend that, as a threshold matter, the
        district court committed legal error by ruling that the three-month
        window established by § 12 of the FAA for filing a motion to vacate
        is subject to equitable tolling. Noting that this Court has not previ-
        ously held that the FAA’s statutory time periods can be equitably
USCA11 Case: 22-10214        Document: 43-1         Date Filed: 06/21/2023        Page: 18 of 36

        18                        Opinion of the Court                       22-10214

        tolled, they argue that § 12 does not permit equitable tolling be-
        cause the three-month window is not a statute of limitations but
        rather a “jurisdictional precondition to judicial review of [the] arbi-
        tration award.” Appellants’ Br. at 10.
                            i. A District Court May Equitably Toll the Three-
                               Month Deadline in § 12 of the FAA.
                The FAA authorizes a district court, “upon the application
        of any party to the arbitration,” to vacate an arbitration award un-
        der a limited set of circumstances, including “where the award was
        procured by corruption, fraud, or undue means.” 9 U.S.C. § 10(a).
        Section 12 requires that “[n]otice of a motion to vacate, modify, or
        correct an award must be served upon the adverse party or his at-
        torney within three months after the award is filed or delivered.”
        9 U.S.C. § 12. Whether a district court may equitably toll § 12’s
        three-month window is a question of first impression in this Cir-
        cuit. 6

        6The closest we have come to answering the question was in Cullen v. Paine,
        Webber, Jackson & Curtis, Inc., 863 F.2d 851 (11th Cir. 1989). In that case, we
        affirmed the district court’s denial of a motion to vacate an arbitration award,
        holding that the appellant’s failure to move to vacate the award within three
        months of its issuance “bar[red] him from raising the alleged invalidity of the
        award.” Id. at 854. But we did not reach the appellant’s tolling argument—that
        the district court nonetheless should have considered his motion because of a
        “due-diligence” exception to § 12. Id. at 853. We did not decide whether such
        an exception existed because the appellant failed to demonstrate, as a factual
        matter, that he was prevented from filing a timely motion such that equitable
        tolling would have been appropriate. Id. at 854.
USCA11 Case: 22-10214      Document: 43-1      Date Filed: 06/21/2023     Page: 19 of 36

        22-10214               Opinion of the Court                         19

                In the absence of clear authority from this Court, the district
        court adopted the reasoning of the Ninth Circuit’s decision in Move,
        Inc. In Move, Inc., the Ninth Circuit held that “the FAA is subject to
        the established doctrine of equitable tolling.” Id. at 1158. The court
        relied on the Supreme Court’s opinion in Holland v. Florida,
        560 U.S. 631 (2010), which “instructed lower courts to consider sev-
        eral textual factors to determine whether Congress intended for
        tolling not to apply to a given statute.” Move, Inc., 840 F.3d at 1157.
        The Holland factors include whether the statute at issue:
               (1) set forth its time limitations in unusually emphatic
               form; (2) used highly detailed and technical language
               that, linguistically speaking, cannot easily be read as
               containing implicit exceptions; (3) reiterated its limi-
               tations several times in several diﬀerent ways; (4) re-
               lated to an underlying subject matter . . . with respect
               to which the practical consequences of permitting
               tolling would have been substantial; and (5) would, if
               tolled, require tolling, not only procedural limita-
               tions, but also substantive limitations on the amount
               of recovery—a kind of tolling for which [the Court]
               found no direct precedent.
        Holland, 560 U.S. at 646–47 (alterations adopted) (internal quota-
        tion marks omitted).
               In Move, Inc., the Ninth Circuit focused on the first three Hol-
        land factors. In applying these factors, the court addressed § 12’s
        text and structure. It concluded that “the text of the statute does
        not preclude equitable tolling,” reasoning that the FAA’s instruc-
        tion that notice of a motion to vacate “must be served” “is neither
USCA11 Case: 22-10214      Document: 43-1      Date Filed: 06/21/2023     Page: 20 of 36

        20                     Opinion of the Court                  22-10214

        ‘unusually generous’ nor ‘unusually emphatic’” and that “the
        FAA’s limitations period is neither detailed nor technical and is not
        reiterated elsewhere in the statute.” 840 F.3d at 1157.
                 The court next examined the argument that the FAA cannot
        accommodate equitable tolling of § 12’s deadline for motions to va-
        cate. Id. The argument went that because § 9 allows one year for a
        party to seek confirmation of an arbitration award, equitably toll-
        ing the deadline for a motion to vacate the same award could mean
        that district courts might be forced to consider motions to vacate
        filed after the court had already confirmed the award. The Ninth
        Circuit concluded that “the FAA’s structure is not incompatible
        with equitable tolling,” because a party seeking vacatur beyond the
        three-month deadline “would still need to meet the heavy burden
        of establishing its entitlement to equitable tolling for a court to va-
        cate an award.” Id. Given the heavy burden, the court observed, “it
        would only be the rare case in which the three-month dead-
        line . . . would not apply.” Id.
                Finally, the Ninth Circuit concluded that “[w]hile the FAA
        reflects the national policy favoring arbitration with just the limited
        review necessary to maintain finality in arbitral proceed-
        ings . . . . § 10’s limited grounds for review were still designed to
        preserve due process.” Id. at 1157–58 (internal quotation marks
        omitted). “[B]alancing the needs for both finality and due process,
        the arbitral process will not be disrupted if parties are permitted to
        satisfy the high bar of equitable tolling in limited circumstances.”
        Id. at 1158.
USCA11 Case: 22-10214        Document: 43-1         Date Filed: 06/21/2023        Page: 21 of 36

        22-10214                  Opinion of the Court                               21

                The defendants here make many of the same arguments that
        the Ninth Circuit rejected in Move, Inc. 7 We find the Ninth Circuit’s
        reasoning thorough and persuasive. We therefore agree with our
        sister circuit that the availability of equitable tolling does not con-
        travene the FAA’s text, structure, or purpose.
                Besides the arguments the Ninth Circuit rejected in Move,
        Inc., the defendants maintain that the three-month window in § 12
        is a “jurisdictional precondition to judicial review of [the] arbitra-
        tion award” and not merely a statute of limitations eligible for toll-
        ing if a party can demonstrate it is appropriate. We disagree.
                Recently, in Boechler, P.C. v. Comm’r of Internal Revenue,
        142 S. Ct. 1493 (2022), the Supreme Court offered relevant guid-
        ance about how to determine whether a statute’s deadlines are ju-
        risdictional, such that a court or agency would be precluded from
        reviewing late filings. In Boechler, the Internal Revenue Service
        (“IRS”) levied upon a law firm’s property to collect a debt for un-
        paid tax liabilities. After losing its challenge to the seizure in a

        7 One such argument is that if tolling were permitted, the FAA’s one-year
        timeline to seek confirmation of an arbitration award would conflict with its
        three-month timeline to seek vacatur of the same award. See Appellants’ Br. at
        7–10. We note that under our precedent the purported conflict could exist
        even in the absence of tolling because a party seeking to confirm an arbitration
        award may seek confirmation as soon as the award is rendered. It need not
        wait until the time for filing a motion to vacate has expired. See McLaurin v.
        Terminix Int’l Co., LP, 13 F.4th 1232, 1240–41 (11th Cir. 2021) (“Nothing in the
        statute prevents a party from moving for confirmation of an award within
        three months of that award or mandates that a district court wait to rule on
        such a motion because another party may file a motion to vacate.”).
USCA11 Case: 22-10214      Document: 43-1      Date Filed: 06/21/2023     Page: 22 of 36

        22                     Opinion of the Court                  22-10214

        “collection due process” hearing before the IRS’s office of appeals,
        the law firm had 30 days to petition for review of the result. Id. at
        1496–97. When it filed the petition one day late, the Tax Court dis-
        missed the appeal for lack of jurisdiction, and the Eighth Circuit
        affirmed. Id. at 1497.
                The statutory provision in question says that a person seek-
        ing review of a negative result in a collection due process hearing
        “may, within 30 days of a determination under this section, petition
        the Tax Court for review of such determination (and the Tax Court
        shall have jurisdiction with respect to such matter).” 26 U.S.C.
        § 6330(d)(1). In the Supreme Court, the IRS Commissioner argued
        that the 30-day period for a taxpayer to file her petition for review
        is a jurisdictional requirement and therefore cannot be equitably
        tolled. Boechler, 142 S. Ct. at 1496. The Commissioner based this ar-
        gument on the provision’s parenthetical language.
                The Supreme Court first observed that the distinction be-
        tween procedural and jurisdictional requirements “matters” be-
        cause the consequences can be severe. Id. at 1497. Whereas the for-
        mer “promote the orderly progress of litigation but do not bear on
        a court’s power,” the latter “mark the bounds of a court’s adjudica-
        tory authority” and “cannot be waived, or forfeited, must be raised
        by courts sua sponte, and . . . do not allow for equitable exceptions.”
        Id. (internal quotation marks omitted).
               The Court rejected the Commissioner’s interpretation. It
        declared that “a procedural requirement” is “jurisdictional only if
        Congress clearly states that it is.” Id. (internal quotation marks
USCA11 Case: 22-10214      Document: 43-1      Date Filed: 06/21/2023      Page: 23 of 36

        22-10214                Opinion of the Court                         23

        omitted). Although “Congress need not incant magic words, . . .
        the traditional tools of statutory construction must plainly show
        that Congress imbued a procedural bar with jurisdictional conse-
        quences.” Id. (internal quotation marks omitted).
                The Court addressed the Commissioner’s argument based
        on the parenthetical language that “the Tax Court shall have juris-
        diction with respect to such matter.” 26 U.S.C. § 6330(d)(1). It rea-
        soned that the Commissioner’s view was plausible—the parenthe-
        tical could be read to condition the Tax Court’s jurisdiction on a
        timely filing. But, the Court reasoned, “the text does not clearly
        mandate the jurisdictional reading,” and “[w]here multiple plausi-
        ble interpretations exist—only one of which is jurisdictional—it is
        difficult to make the case that the jurisdictional reading is clear.”
        Boechler, 142 S. Ct. at 1498. It explained that nothing else in the text
        or structure of the provision or the statute, read as a whole, com-
        pelled a jurisdictional interpretation. Id. at 1498–99. Relying on its
        textual analysis, the Court held that the 30-day time limit was an
        “ordinary, non-jurisdictional deadline subject to equitable tolling.”
        Id. at 1501.
               Unlike the filing deadline in Boechler, the three-month limi-
        tation in § 12 makes no reference to jurisdiction. It merely instructs
        that “[n]otice of a motion to vacate, modify, or correct an award
        must be served upon the adverse party or his attorney within three
        months after the award is filed or delivered.” 9 U.S.C. § 12. Thus,
        the argument that the time limit in § 12 is jurisdictional is even
        weaker than the argument the Court rejected in Boechler. The
USCA11 Case: 22-10214     Document: 43-1      Date Filed: 06/21/2023         Page: 24 of 36

        24                     Opinion of the Court                  22-10214

        language “must be served” does not communicate the sort of “ju-
        risdictional clarity” that Boechler requires. Boechler, 142 S. Ct. at
        1498. We reject the defendants’ argument.
               We hold that the three-month window in § 12 may be equi-
        tably tolled in the appropriate circumstances. To be clear, we hold
        only that equitable tolling is available in the FAA context. Litigants
        still must demonstrate that their cases present circumstances war-
        ranting this extraordinary remedy. Below we consider whether
        NuVasive has presented such circumstances.
                         ii. The District Court Did Not Err by Equitably
                             Tolling § 12’s Statutory Deadline and Consid-
                             ering NuVasive’s Motion to Vacate the Final
                             Award.
               The defendants next argue that even if equitable tolling is
        available in the FAA context, the district court erred in concluding
        the three-month filing deadline should be tolled in this case. They
        contend that Soufleris’s conduct did not qualify as extraordinary
        circumstances and that NuVasive was insufficiently diligent in pur-
        suing its rights to warrant tolling of the deadline for filing its mo-
        tion to vacate the arbitration award.
               “Equitable tolling is an extraordinary remedy which is typi-
        cally applied sparingly.” Brown, 512 F.3d at 1307 (internal quotation
        marks omitted). It is “appropriate when a movant untimely files
        because of extraordinary circumstances that are both beyond his con-
        trol and unavoidable even with diligence.” Arce v. Garcia, 434 F.3d
        1254, 1260 (11th Cir. 2006) (internal quotation marks omitted). In
USCA11 Case: 22-10214     Document: 43-1      Date Filed: 06/21/2023     Page: 25 of 36

        22-10214               Opinion of the Court                        25

        this context, due diligence is “reasonable diligence.” Holland,
        560 U.S. at 653 (internal quotation marks omitted).
               The district court concluded that NuVasive satisfied both
        the “extraordinary circumstances” and “diligence” prongs of the
        equitable-tolling test. Doc. 371 at 13. It found that Soufleris’s mes-
        sages to Hawley during Hawley’s arbitration testimony, along with
        the defendants’ efforts to conceal the messages by defying discov-
        ery requests and orders, presented extraordinary circumstances.
        We address each prong of the analysis.
               First, extraordinary circumstances. As we described above,
        the evidence NuVasive presented to support its motion revealed
        shocking conduct by Soufleris and Hawley at the arbitration pro-
        ceeding. Before Hawley began his arbitration testimony, he took
        an oath affirming that there was no one in the room with him and
        no one communicating with him. Although the former was true,
        the latter was not. While Hawley testified, he received text mes-
        sages from Soufleris concerning the content of Hawley’s testi-
        mony. When this conduct was discovered, Hawley submitted a
        declaration denying that he had read the messages while testifying.
        But by comparing Soufleris’s messages and their timing with Haw-
        ley’s testimony, NuVasive showed, and the district court found,
        that Hawley’s testimony was consistent with Soufleris’s contempo-
        raneous text messages. In at least one instance, Hawley revised his
        answers to comport with Soufleris’s suggestions. Further, having
        observed the defendants’ conduct in discovery, the district court
        found that it was “clear that Defendants were intentionally
USCA11 Case: 22-10214     Document: 43-1      Date Filed: 06/21/2023     Page: 26 of 36

        26                     Opinion of the Court                 22-10214

        attempting to run out the clock on Plaintiff’s time to file a motion
        to vacate by failing to produce the documents that could show mis-
        conduct during the arbitration.” Doc. 371 at 13. We cannot say that
        these factual findings are clearly erroneous. And we agree with the
        district court that the conduct and the cover-up together constitute
        the sort of “extraordinary circumstances” contemplated by the doc-
        trine of equitable tolling. Id. The district court did not err in con-
        cluding NuVasive satisfied this prong.
                Turning to the due diligence prong, the district court found
        that NuVasive could not have known about the text messages be-
        tween Soufleris and Hawley until after the defendants produced
        the documents NuVasive requested. Once the text messages were
        produced, the court found, based on the “sequence of events,” that
        NuVasive acted diligently by requesting permission from the court
        to file a motion to vacate the Final Award mere days later. Id. at 12.
        The record provides ample support for the district court’s findings
        that NuVasive acted quickly once it learned about the text mes-
        sages. We thus agree with the district court’s conclusion that
        “Plaintiff was diligently pursuing its rights.” Id.
               On appeal, the defendants contend that “a diligent lawyer
        for NuVasive would certainly have looked for [fraud] during the
        available 90-day window . . . [;] for example, [the lawyer] would
        have immediately pursued discovery concerning the arbitration
        panel, the witnesses, their text messages and the whole record—
        looking for any proof of misconduct not detected in the arbitration
        proceeding itself.” Appellants’ Br. at 18. This argument—which
USCA11 Case: 22-10214        Document: 43-1        Date Filed: 06/21/2023        Page: 27 of 36

        22-10214                  Opinion of the Court                              27

        attempts to blame NuVasive for failing to investigate fraud when
        there was no reason to suspect fraud—hardly warrants comment.
        The district court found that any purported delay or lack of dili-
        gence by NuVasive was due entirely to defendants’ misconduct
        and that the defendants “actively subvert[ed] discovery requests
        and a Court Order by failing to timely produce the requested com-
        munications.” Doc. 371 at 12. Had the defendants timely per-
        formed their discovery obligations, the production that included
        the Soufleris-Hawley text messages would have been in NuVa-
        sive’s counsel’s hands more than four months earlier. 8 Once NuVa-
        sive learned of the text messages, it promptly moved for leave to
        file a motion to vacate within a few days. And after the district
        court granted leave, NuVasive filed its motion to vacate less than a
        week later.
               Nor are we persuaded by the defendants’ argument that
        their delayed responses were irrelevant to the diligence inquiry.
        They say that, even if they had produced the documents by the
        ordered date, NuVasive’s motion to vacate still would have been
        too late because the “responses were not due until twenty-three

        8 The original deadline for producing documents was June 30, 2021. When the
        defendants’ document production was lacking, NuVasive sought the district
        court’s assistance by filing a motion to compel, and the district court ordered
        that Soufleris and AMS produce the documents. The district court’s deadline
        for production was August 26, 2021, but Soufleris and AMS did not produce
        the documents until November 4, in violation of the order compelling pro-
        duction.
USCA11 Case: 22-10214        Document: 43-1         Date Filed: 06/21/2023         Page: 28 of 36

        28                         Opinion of the Court                       22-10214

        days after the 90-day period expired on June 2, 2021.” 9 Appellants’
        Br. at 18. But, again, in the absence of any indication that fraud or
        misconduct had occurred, it would not have been reasonable to
        expect NuVasive to try to discover any. On this record, it is auda-
        cious indeed for the defendants to suggest that had NuVasive
        sought “evidence of fraud in the arbitration,” id., they would
        simply have offered it up. In any event, the district court properly
        tolled the filing deadline on the motion to vacate, so the defend-
        ants’ argument fails.
                Based on our review of the record, the district court’s find-
        ings of fact were not clearly erroneous, and they supported the dis-
        trict court’s conclusion that NuVasive satisfied both prongs of the
        equitable tolling analysis. The defendants’ conduct presented ex-
        traordinary circumstances, and NuVasive was diligent once it
        learned that there was reason to pursue vacatur. The district court
        did not err in concluding that the deadline to move for vacatur

        9 Although it is ultimately immaterial, we note that the defendants erred in
        calculating when the statutory deadline expired because they counted 90 days,
        rather than three months, as the statute says. See 9 U.S.C. § 12. The arbitration
        panel issued the Final Award on March 4, 2021. Three months from that date
        expired on June 4, not June 2 as the defendants say.
                We acknowledge that even had the defendants complied with the June
        30 deadline, any motion to vacate based on produced documents would have
        been filed outside of the three-month window. But that fact is irrelevant to the
        question whether NuVasive was diligent for equitable tolling purposes. NuVa-
        sive acted diligently as soon as it became aware there was a reason to contest
        the Final Award.
USCA11 Case: 22-10214        Document: 43-1         Date Filed: 06/21/2023        Page: 29 of 36

        22-10214                  Opinion of the Court                               29

        should be equitably tolled such that NuVasive’s motion was
        timely.
        B.     The District Court Did Not Err by Vacating the Final
               Award
                The defendants urge that even if the district court did not
        err in tolling the three-month window and thus was permitted to
        consider NuVasive’s motion to vacate the Final Award under 9
        U.S.C. § 10(a), the court abused its discretion by granting the mo-
        tion and vacating the award. They argue that the district court
        erred in determining that NuVasive proved fraud by clear and con-
        vincing evidence and that the fraud was not materially related to
        an issue in the arbitration.
               A district court “may,” in its discretion, vacate an arbitration
        award “upon the application of any party to the arbitration” if “the
        award was procured by corruption, fraud, or undue means.”
        9 U.S.C. § 10(a)(1). This Court uses “a three part test to determine
        whether an arbitration award should be vacated for fraud.” Bonar,
        835 F.2d at 1383. First, the moving party “must establish the fraud
        by clear and convincing evidence”; second, “the fraud must not
        have been discoverable upon the exercise of due diligence prior to
        or during the arbitration”; and third, “the person seeking to vacate
        the award must demonstrate that the fraud materially related to an
        issue in the arbitration.” Id. 10

        10 In their briefing, the defendants conflate the distinct issues of whether the
        district court erred by applying equitable tolling and by vacating the Final
USCA11 Case: 22-10214        Document: 43-1         Date Filed: 06/21/2023         Page: 30 of 36

        30                         Opinion of the Court                       22-10214

                In its order granting the motion to vacate the Final Award,
        the district court concluded that all three prongs were satisfied. To
        support its conclusion on the first prong, that NuVasive established
        fraud by clear and convincing evidence, the district court pointed
        to its timeline comparing Soufleris’s messages to Hawley during
        Hawley’s arbitration testimony with Hawley’s contemporaneous
        testimony. Based on its side-by-side comparison of the text mes-
        sages and Hawley’s contemporaneous testimony, the district court
        found that “three specific instances during Hawley’s testimony that
        establishe[d] by clear and convincing evidence that his testimony
        was indeed being guided by Soufleris’s messages.” Doc. 371 at 15.
        In each instance, Hawley appeared to change his answer after Sou-
        fleris directed him to not implicate Absolute Medical. These in-
        stances included testimony about: whether Hawley had signed
        compliance agreements that the Agreement required, whether
        Hawley’s compliance agreements had been sent to or withheld
        from NuVasive, and whether Hawley had provided a NuVasive de-
        vice to Alphatec. Based on these factual findings, the district court
        concluded that “the complete alignment of all of Hawley’s testi-
        mony with Soufleris’s messages” compelled the conclusion that
        NuVasive “establishe[d] by clear and convincing evidence that
        Hawley was reading Soufleris’s messages in real-time while

        Award. As a result, the defendants do not directly contest the district court’s
        findings on the second prong of the vacatur-for-fraud test. Instead, their brief
        discusses diligence only in the context of equitable tolling. See Appellants’ Br.
        at 18. For clarity, we discuss these issues separately.
USCA11 Case: 22-10214        Document: 43-1         Date Filed: 06/21/2023        Page: 31 of 36

        22-10214                  Opinion of the Court                               31

        Hawley was testifying and conforming his testimony to Soufleris’s
        messages.” Doc. 371 at 17.
                The defendants respond with Hawley’s declaration, filed af-
        ter the text messages came to light, that he did not see the text mes-
        sages during his testimony. But the district court was free to disbe-
        lieve Hawley’s declaration in the face of contrary evidence that he
        conformed his answers to Soufleris’s instructions in the messages
        in real-time. The defendants have pointed us to nothing in the rec-
        ord showing that the district court’s factual findings on the first
        prong were clearly erroneous. The district court did not err by de-
        termining that NuVasive established the defendants’ fraud by clear
        and convincing evidence.
                On the second prong, the district court concluded that
        NuVasive “could not have discovered prior to arbitration that Sou-
        fleris was planning to improperly direct Hawley’s testimony” and
        that “it also could not have discovered the fraud while it was ongo-
        ing because Hawley’s testimony was occurring via video feed.” Id.
        at 18. As the district court observed, the arbitration was conducted
        from remote locations over videoconference—Hawley, Soufleris,
        and NuVasive’s counsel were all in different states while Hawley
        testified. The defendants do not explain how NuVasive could have
        discovered the coaching remotely. 11 They point to the facts that

        11 And given that, before testifying, Hawley took an oath affirming that there
        was no one in the room with him and no one was communicating with him,
        it was reasonable for NuVasive to believe, in reliance on this oath, that no one
        was coaching him.
USCA11 Case: 22-10214      Document: 43-1      Date Filed: 06/21/2023      Page: 32 of 36

        32                      Opinion of the Court                  22-10214

        “Hawley was visible to all viewers as he testified via his laptop com-
        puter” and “[t]here is no suggestion in the record that anyone, in-
        cluding the three arbitrators and [NuVasive’s] team of attorneys,
        noticed any suspected coaching behaviors.” Appellants’ Br. at 21.
        But that is precisely the point: there was no noticeable behavior. It
        was only once the text messages were produced that they could be
        compared to Hawley’s testimony. The district court’s factual find-
        ings as to the second Bonar prong were not clearly erroneous.
                Finally, the district court determined that NuVasive’s mo-
        tion satisfied the third Bonar prong because Soufleris’s messages
        and Hawley’s arbitration testimony were materially related to an
        issue in the arbitration. The district court determined that Haw-
        ley’s testimony “related directly” to issues that the court had or-
        dered the parties to resolve through arbitration, including
        (1) whether the sales representatives working for Absolute Medical
        had executed the compliance agreements required by the Agree-
        ment; (2) whether the defendants violated the compliance agree-
        ments; and (3) whether Absolute Medical took any action to en-
        force the compliance agreements. Doc. 371 at 19. As a factual mat-
        ter, the district court did not err: Soufleris’s text messages instruct-
        ing Hawley on how to answer the questions addressed each of
        these areas.
               The defendants do not dispute this fact. Instead, they argue
        that the fraud Soufleris and Hawley perpetrated was not material
        because the arbitration panel’s decision not to award lost profits
        damages in the Final Award was based on a failure of proof as to
USCA11 Case: 22-10214     Document: 43-1      Date Filed: 06/21/2023    Page: 33 of 36

        22-10214               Opinion of the Court                       33

        loss causation and the amount of damages, not the subject matter
        of Hawley’s testimony. Therefore, they say, even if the text mes-
        sages influenced Hawley’s testimony, the testimony had no impact
        on the arbitration panel’s decision.
               Our precedent dooms this argument. In Bonar we said that
        the materiality element “does not require the movant to establish
        that the result of the proceedings would have been different had
        the fraud not occurred.” 835 F.2d at 1383. Thus, NuVasive need not
        prove that it would have succeeded in proving causation and dam-
        ages absent the unlawful coaching, nor was it required to prove
        that the subject matter on which Hawley was coached concerned
        causation and damages specifically. Rather, the test is whether the
        fraud was “materially related to an issue in the arbitration.” Id. We
        reject the defendants’ attempt to define “issue in the arbitration”
        more narrowly than our precedent allows. To permit a party who
        committed fraud to render its fraud immaterial in this way would
        undermine the purpose of vacatur for fraud under § 10(a)(1).
               The issues the district court identified as impacted by Haw-
        ley’s corrupted testimony all were “issue[s] in the arbitration.” In-
        deed, whether the defendants breached the Agreement as it per-
        tained to the compliance agreements was the primary liability issue
        in the arbitration. The district court correctly concluded that the
        fraud was materially related to that issue. Thus, the district court
        did not err in vacating the Final Award under § 10(a).
USCA11 Case: 22-10214        Document: 43-1        Date Filed: 06/21/2023        Page: 34 of 36

        34                        Opinion of the Court                      22-10214

        C.     The District Court Did Not Abuse its Discretion by
               Declining to Direct a Rehearing by the Arbitration
               Panel
               The final issue the defendants raise on appeal is whether, af-
        ter vacating the Final Award, the district court abused its discretion
        by failing to direct a rehearing by the arbitration panel, either to
        determine whether any fraud took place or for a rehearing of the
        arbitrated claims. The defendants argue that the district court’s de-
        cision not to send the arbitrated claim back to the arbitration panel
        was improperly based on a desire to punish them. They further ar-
        gue that the district court should not have considered prejudice to
        NuVasive in deciding whether to send the claim back because
        NuVasive voluntarily entered into the dispute resolution agree-
        ment. Therefore, they say, it could not claim prejudice from being
        forced to arbitrate. NuVasive responds that this issue was not
        properly noticed on appeal and that, even if it was, the district court
        did not abuse its discretion.
               The FAA provides that “[i]f an award is vacated . . . the court
        may, in its discretion, direct a rehearing by the arbitrators.” 9 U.S.C.
        § 10(b) (emphasis added). We agree with the district court that the
        FAA granted it “complete discretion about how to proceed” with
        the case after the Final Award was vacated. Doc. 371 at 20. Tell-
        ingly, the defendants cite no authority to the contrary.12 And the

        12 The defendants rely on Bonar in arguing that remand is the normal course
        following the vacatur of an arbitration award. In Bonar, the fraud at issue in-
        volved a retained expert witness who lied about his education credentials, not
USCA11 Case: 22-10214        Document: 43-1         Date Filed: 06/21/2023        Page: 35 of 36

        22-10214                  Opinion of the Court                               35

        district court did not abuse the discretion the FAA afforded it. The
        court carefully considered how to proceed upon vacating the arbi-
        tration award, taking into account the facts leading to the vacatur;
        the defendants’ past misconduct throughout the litigation, includ-
        ing intentional destruction of “vast amounts of evidence,” Doc. 371
        at 21, by defendants and their counsel which led to spoliation sanc-
        tions; and finally, the unlikelihood that a remand to the arbitration
        panel could cure the harm from the defendants’ misconduct. We
        also reject the defendants’ prejudice argument; we are uncon-
        vinced that NuVasive’s voluntary participation in the Agreement’s
        dispute resolution clause required the district court to compel re-
        arbitration. NuVasive’s objection was not to arbitration generally,
        but to re-arbitration after the defendant’s brazen, serious miscon-
        duct. We therefore cannot say that the court abused its discretion
        when it decided to retain control over the entire case after vacating
        the Final Award.13

        two of the parties themselves. See 835 F.2d at 1383–84 (reversing an arbitration
        panel’s award of punitive damages and remanding to a new arbitration panel
        following the discovery of a retained expert witness’s false testimony). What
        is more, Bonar did not hold that a district court must remand to an arbitration
        panel following vacatur.
        13 Because we conclude that the district court did not abuse its discretion, we
        need not address NuVasive’s argument that the defendants failed to raise this
        issue properly on appeal.
USCA11 Case: 22-10214   Document: 43-1    Date Filed: 06/21/2023   Page: 36 of 36

        36                  Opinion of the Court              22-10214

                             IV.    CONCLUSION
               For the reasons discussed above, we affirm the district
        court’s order.
              AFFIRMED.