ITC Commissioners Remain Split On Cease And Desist Orders

We previously wrote about the ITC Commissioners' split on the standard for the issuance of cease and desist orders. In recent opinions, Commissioners Schmidtlein and Kieff have written separately to express their view that ITC precedent requiring a complainant to show commercially significant domestic inventory of accused products in order to obtain a cease and desist orders should be overturned. This month, in Certain Arrowheads with Deploying Blades and Components Thereof and Packaging Therefor, Inv. No. 337-TA-977, the Commission weighed in on the standard for obtaining a cease and desist order where the respondents default. The majority held that the ITC will only issue a cease and desist order against a defaulting respondent when evidence of domestic inventory of accused products is provided in the complaint. In such circumstances, the ITC will presume that the domestic inventory is commercially significant because the respondent defaulted.