Case number and/or case name
OLG Düsseldorf, 26.4.2012 – I-2 U 18/12
Summary
The plaintiff B. is a German distribution subsidiary. The defendant (1) is a company whose directors are the defendants (2) to (5). The defendant (1) brought an action before the Stockholms tingsrätt against the parent group of the plaintiff. The plaintiff B. brought an action before the German courts against the defendants (1) to (5) because of infringement of intellectual property rights.
The court held that it was possible to assume the existence of ‘the same parties’ pursuant to Art. 27 (1) Brussels I if the involved parties had the same interests even given the fact that there were two proceedings before different courts having formally different parties. This could be assumed when the other party the legal force of the judgment extended to the other party, too. The issue of legal force had to be considered under the law of the country whose courts had been seised first and therefore had priority to decide.
The court referred to the jurisdiction of the CJEU concerning the identity of interests and applied it to the present case. It is in accordance with the purpose of Art. 27 Brussels I, that is to avoid contradictory decisions, that legal force affecting the other party can be an indicator for the presence common interests. The judgment is correct.