Snapkeys, LTD v. Google LLC

Background

Snapkeys filed the case against Google on May 16, 2019. Before the court was Snapkeys’ motion for permission to file a Fourth Amended Complaint. That proposed complaint would have been Snapkeys’ fifth complaint in the case.

Snapkeys had previously filed its original complaint, a First Amended Complaint, a Second Amended Complaint, and a Third Amended Complaint. Google had filed three motions to dismiss. The court had granted in part and denied in part one of those motions with leave to amend. Later, the court dismissed Snapkeys’ amended claim under California’s Unfair Competition Law with prejudice and concluded that further amendment of that claim would be futile, unfairly prejudice Google, and cause undue delay.

Legal standards

Under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 15(a), courts generally allow amendments to pleadings when justice requires. Relevant considerations include bad faith, undue delay, prejudice to the opposing party, whether amendment would be futile, and whether the plaintiff previously amended the complaint.

Because Snapkeys sought amendment after the court’s deadline for amending pleadings, Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 16 also applied. That rule required Snapkeys to show good cause to change the case schedule. The court explained that good cause primarily depends on the diligence of the party seeking the amendment.

Court’s analysis

The court found undue delay, undue prejudice to Google, and three previous amendments, and therefore did not need to address the other Rule 15 factors. Snapkeys had nearly eighteen months to finalize its pleadings and had stated in an October 21, 2020 case-management statement that it planned to seek permission to amend. It did not file the motion until December 18, 2020, after fact discovery had closed on November 27, 2020.

The court also found prejudice to Google. Google had already filed three motions to dismiss and had a fully briefed motion for summary judgment awaiting decision. Another amended complaint could have required Google to file another motion to dismiss and a second motion for summary judgment. It also could have required renewed summary-judgment briefing and delayed the scheduled pretrial conference and trial. The court noted that it had previously extended the fact-discovery deadline and related deadlines at Snapkeys’ request.

Finally, the court concluded that Snapkeys had not shown good cause to alter the case schedule at that late stage.

Disposition

The court denied Snapkeys’ motion for leave to file a Fourth Amended Complaint. This order addressed whether Snapkeys could amend its pleading; it did not decide the underlying claims on their merits.