Court of Cassation, No. 14-26.482

Court of Cassation, First Civil Chamber, 18 November 2015, No. 14-26.482

Cour d’appel de Paris, Pôle 1 - chambre 1, 26 septembre 2017, n° 16/15338

HOECHST GMBH

SANOFI-AVENTIS DEUTSCHLAND GMBH

Vs.

GENENTECH INC

THE COURT OF CASSATION, FIRST CIVIL CHAMBER, rendered the following judgment:

On the admissibility of the appeal, contested in defence:

In view of Article 267 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union;

Whereas, according to the judgment under appeal (Paris, 23 September 2014), the German company Behringwerke, specialised in biotechnologies, to whose rights the German company Hoescht belongs, granted, with retroactive effect from 1 January 1991, to the company Genentech, of the State of Delaware, a worldwide non-exclusive licence for the use of a biotechnology ; that a related patent was revoked and the licensee stopped paying royalties; that Sanofi-Aventis Deutschland, a subsidiary of Hoechst, then implemented the arbitration clause stipulated in the licence agreement;

By a partial award rendered in Paris on 5 September 2012, the sole arbitrator found Genentech liable for the marketing of several products and ordered it to pay Hoechst various sums;

Whereas Hoechst and Sanofi-Aventis Deutschland complain that the judgment referred a question to the Court of Justice of the European Union for a preliminary ruling;

Whereas the Court of Appeal, which did not carry out any review of the award with regard to Article 1520-5 of the Code of Civil Procedure, merely made use of the faculty offered to it by the aforementioned Article 267, to request the Court of Justice to rule on a question of interpretation of the Treaty; that the grounds invoked do not characterise an excess of power, the cassation appeal filed independently of the decision on the merits is, in the absence of special provisions of the law, inadmissible;

FOR THESE REASONS:

DECLARES the appeal inadmissible;

Orders Hoechst and Sanofi-Aventis Deutschland to pay the costs;

In view of Article 700 of the Code of Civil Procedure, orders them to pay the company Genetech Inc. the total sum of 3,000 euros;

Thus, done and judged by the Court of Cassation, First Civil Chamber, and pronounced by the president in its public hearing of the eighteenth of November two thousand and fifteen.