HI5015 Legal Aspects Of International Business And Enterprise

Metro Industries v Sammi Corporation

In the case Metro Industries v Sammi Corporation, Metro appealed against court’s Summary ruling in favor of Sammi Corporation on the Metro’s Sherman Act section 1, which was about the market division claim. However, the court denied Metro to cross-motion the Summary judgment. Section 1 of the Sherman Antitrust Act states that; every combined contract in the form of trust or conspiracy in order to control trade among various States or foreign countries is acknowledged as illegal. In this case, Metro claims that the market division agreement of the Korean Holloware Association is uncovered, which according to Sherman Act is per se illegal. Hence, Metro argument is that the examination of the impact of the registration system on competition in the U.S. will not violate section 1.

Being that any conduct happening in outside the U.S.is a violation of Sherman Act only if it has adequate negative impact on trade in the United States., the analysis of per se is not suitable. Additionally, Metro argues that when the claimed illegal behavior happened in a foreign nation, its impact on trade must get examined in the U.S. before determining the subject matter jurisdiction over the claim. The court ruled that because the same facts got determined by Vollrath panel the relevant market and the power of Sammi in that market had not been properly defined. Therefore, Metro cannot prove damage to competition according to the record of Vollrath, and also cannot recover on the claims it made on Sherman Act.

To conclude with, Where a Sherman Act depends on the behavior outside the U.S., analysis of reasoning rule is applied to determine if there is any violation of the Sherman Act.