From Law360:
The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday put tighter restrictions on where patent owners can file infringement lawsuits, a decision that upends nearly 30 years of established practice and will likely force many lawsuits out of the patent litigation hotbed of the Eastern District of Texas.
In an 8-0 decision, the Supreme Court reversed a Federal Circuit rule that effectively allowed a patent holder to file suit anywhere a defendant makes sales, which critics complained has fueled a plague of forum shopping and a concentration of cases in a few jurisdictions.
Ruling in favor of liquid sweetener maker TC Heartland LLC, the justices reinstated a more restrictive standard from a 1957 Supreme Court decision, saying it remained good law.
“We therefore hold that a domestic corporation ‘resides’ only in its State of incorporation for purposes of the patent venue statute,” the court wrote.