This outcome validates our interpretation of the appeals court’s prior order, which was not shared by Judge Albright and BMW.
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Courts and counsel
BMW v. Onesta (case no. 6:25-cv-00581, W.D. Tex.; PI appeal: case no. 2026-1338, Fed. Cir.)
The case was initally assigned to United States District Judge Kathleen Cardone. BMW’s complaint suggested that it should ideally be assigned to Judge Alan D. Albright, which indeed happened.
Counsel for BMW: Finnegan, Henderson, Farabow, Garrett & Dunner’s Lionel M. Lavenue, J. Derek McCorquindale (both of Reston, VA), Matthew C. Berntsen (of Boston, MA), and Joseph M. Myles (of Washington, DC).
Onesta has presumably anticipated this course of action, which is why it involved U.S. counsel early on. The Mintz firm advised Onesta with a view to the Munich filing. In the Western District of Texas, the following attorneys entered appearances on Onesta’s behalf:
- Cherry Johnson Siegmund and James’s Mark D. Siegmund, and
- Caldwell Cassady Curry’s Jason D. Cassady, J. Austin Curry, Daniel R. Pearson, and Aisha Mahmood Haley.
To its opposition brief in district court, Onesta attached an expert report written by Professor Peter Georg Picht, who is the chair of Zurich University’s Center for Intellectual Property & Competition Law (CIPCO), an Affiliated Research Fellow at the Max Planck Institute for Innovation and Competition, and the President of ASCOLA, the international Academic Society for Competition Law. He also taught/teaches at King’s College London, the European University Institute (Florence), the Centre for International Intellectual Property Studies (Strasbourg), and the Max Planck Institute in Munich.
Onesta v. BMW (Munich I Regional Court cases nos. 21 O 13056/25 and 21 O 13057/25)
Presiding Judge: On February 1, 2026, Judge Dr. Hubertus Schacht, who is presently sitting by designation on the regional appeals court, the Oberlandesgericht MĂĽnchen (Munich Higher Regional Court), will become the 21st Civil Chamber’s Presiding Judge (January 16, 2026 ip fray article).
Onesta is being represented in Munich by Peterreins Schley Patent- und Rechtsanwälte’s Dr. Thomas Adam, Dr. Simon Reuter, Dr. Claudia Feller, and Dr. Jan-Malte Schley.
A sworn declaration by Finnegan’s Dr. Johannes Druschel was attached to the U.S. antisuit motion. But BMW’s go-to counsel in German patent litigation (and frequently also counsel for Qualcomm, whose chips are at issue) is the Bardehle Pagenberg firm (ip fray firm profile with numerous achievements). The following Bardehle team is defending BMW and, by extension, Qualcomm in Munich against Onesta:
- Attorneys-at-law Professor Dr. Tilman Mueller-Stoy (“Müller-Stoy” in German), Dr. Martin Drews, and Dr. Tomasz Klama.
- Patent attorneys Dr. Patrick Heckeler, Dr. Christian Haupt, Michael Horndasch, Max Link, and Dr. Maximilian Vieweg.
Two renowned patent law scholars also provided testimony in support of BMW’s motion in district court: Professor Margo A. Bagley of Emory University, who has also been a faculty lecturer at the Max Planck Institute’s Munich Intellectual Property Law Center since 2012, and Professor Matthias Leistner of Munich’s Ludwig Maximilian University.