The case of the day is Devas Multimedia Pvt. Ltd. v. Antrix Corp. Ltd. (S. Ct. 2025), my “case to watch” from March 7, 2025. Antrix was an Indian state-owned enterprise that promoted and marketed the Indian space program. It signed a satellite leasing contract with Devas, an Indian company, und which Antrix would build a satellite and put it in geostationary orbit, and Devas would lease network capacity on the satellite to provide multimedia broadcasting service throughout India. After years of work leading up to the launch, but before the launch itself, the Indian government decided it needed the S-band spectrum, the part of the satellite’s spectrum that Devas planned to lease, for its own purposes. So it caused Antrix to terminate the contract, citing the government’s new policy and the force majeure clause. Devas brought an arbitration, asserting that the force majeure was “self-induced” and that Antrix was liable for breach. The arbitrators awarded more than $500 million in damages. Devas confirmed the award in courts in France and the UK and sought confirmation in the Western District of Washington. Antrix moved to dismiss on the grounds that the court lacked jurisdiction. That argument seems like a loser on its face, because the FSIA has an exception to the ordinary rule of foreign sovereign immunity in cases seeking confirmation of an arbitral award if the award is “governed by a treaty or other international agreement in force for the United States calling for the recognition and enforcement of arbitral awards.” And the district court did confirm the award and entered a $1.3 billion judgment.

Then the case took a turn. An Indian court held that Devas had fraudulently induced Antrix to enter into the contract. The Indian government then seized Devas in order to wind down its business. Several shareholders, and an American subsidiary of the company, then sought to intervene in the US case so that they could seek to enforce the judgment, and the court allowed the intervention. An Indian court also set aside the award in light of the finding of fraud.

On appeal, the Ninth Circuit reversed, holding that the district court lacked personal jurisdiction. Come again? Ordinarily everyone understands that when an FSIA exception to foreign sovereign immunity applies, the court necessarily has personal jurisdiction. The statute says that the court has personal jurisdiction “as to every claim for relief over which the district courts have jurisdiction” because no exception to immunity applies “where service has been made under [28 U.S.C. §] 1608.” But the Ninth Circuit held that Devas also had to show sufficient minimum contacts between the sovereign defendant and the United States. Hence today’s case.

Today’s unanimous decision, by Justice Alito, dispatched the Ninth Circuit’s statutory analysis. The text of the statute is pretty darn clear, and in fact, the requirement of connection with the United States is built into many of the FSIA’s exceptions.¹ The Court also found the legislative history supported the conclusion. I am always happy to see the Court cite legislative history, and in particular the House Report on the FSIA, though I note that here it cited the legislative history “to the extent it is relevant,” which I assume was the price of keeping the decision unanimous.

But Devas didn’t even try to defend the Ninth Circuit’s statutory analysis. Instead, it argued that the minimum contacts requirement followed from the Due Process Clause, which is to say that a foreign sovereign is a “person” entitled to due process for constitutional purposes. Unfortunately but probably predictably, the Court avoided decision on that issue, because the Ninth Circuit hadn’t addressed it. Thus it remanded the case for further proceedings.

1. The commercial activity exception, for example, requires commercial activity “carried on in the United States,” or a commercial act abroad “that causes a direct effect in the United States.” The expropriation exception requires that the expropriated property, or property exchanged for it, be “present in the United States in connection with a commercial activity carried on in the United States.” And so on. ↩︎