On 20 October 2025, Meade J handed down judgment in Amazon.com, Inc v InterDigital VC Holdings, Inc [2025] EWHC 2708 (Pat). At an ex parte hearing, Amazon was granted an anti-anti-suit injunction (AASI) prohibiting InterDigital from taking any steps to restrain Amazon’s pursuit of certain claims in pending proceedings in the Patents Court. The AASI was continued at a return date hearing on 30 October 2025.
The AASI was sought on a non-contractual basis, i.e. in the absence of an English exclusive jurisdiction or arbitration agreement. The Court based its decision on (i) the need to protect the English court’s jurisdiction; and (ii) vexation or oppression: [26]-[31]. Meade J held there was power to grant the AASI notwithstanding a challenge by InterDigital to the English court’s jurisdiction, citing Magomedov v PJSC Transneft [2024] 4 WLR 284: [24], [31].
Amazon’s application was made against the backdrop of ASIs recently made – against it, on InterDigital’s application – by the German Regional Court in Munich and by the Unified Patent Court (UPC). The ASIs concerned other claims in the English proceedings, not those that were the object of Amazon’s application. So far as comity was concerned, Meade J concluded that the impact of the AASI on the conduct of the German and UPC proceedings ‘will almost certainly be nil’: [36].
The judgment is available here.
Anton Dudnikov KC, together with Henry Ward, appeared for Amazon at the ex parte hearing. On the return date, Amazon was represented by Paul Key KC. They were instructed by Paul Brown of Hogan Lovells.
