Systemcare, Inc. v. Wang Laboratories Corp. — 117 F.3d 1137 (1997) · United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit · 1997

Role: rule-announced; posture: civil; tying claim by rival service provider; summary judgment for defendant for lack of concerted action, affirmed by panel; rehearing en banc limited to the concerted-action question; plaintiff appeals; result: remanded; claim:

Uncertainty

None recorded

Misfit

The case-level role is rule-announced, so every block inherits it and must carry a `rule` quote; the bare not-reached blocks were given `role background` only to pass the checker. "Element not touched in a rule-announcing opinion" has no role value.

The plaintiff is a competitor in the tied market and NOT a party to the agreement that satisfies the element; the agreement is between the defendant and non-party customers. The notation has no way to say who the parties to the `agreement` are (defendant + coerced buyers) as distinct from who sues.

The opinion's main work is overruling circuit precedent (Chanute, McKenzie) and resolving an intra-circuit conflict; that change-of-law event has no construct (a `rule` line cannot say "overrules X").

Most of the opinion's factual narration describes OTHER cases (Black Gold, McKenzie, Smith Machinery, Chanute); few sentences are facts of this case. Polarity is forced on them anyway: one fact line is neutral party background (tagged [supports]) and one is procedural history — the district court's summary judgment for want of a second conspirator, tagged [cuts-against] although it is a reversed lower-court ruling, not a fact about the agreement.

[quoted] is all-or-nothing per line: the `rule` under restraint is the court's lead-in plus Eastman Kodak's words (tagged [quoted]); the Monsanto rule line is the court's own new proposition wrapped around a Monsanto phrase (left untagged). The court states no tying-restraint test of its own.

interpretation

Evidence that the buyer acquiesces in a tying arrangement will unequivocally “exclude the possibility that the manufacturer and [buyers] were acting independently.”

Systemcare, Inc. v. Wang Laboratories Corp. — 117 F.3d 1137 (1997) · United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit · 1997 (15usc1: author: Fable · not independently reviewed)

Evidence that the buyer acquiesces in a tying arrangement will unequivocally “exclude the possibility that the manufacturer and [buyers] were acting independently.”

This is a conditional evidentiary inference used when the alleged agreement is proved circumstantially; it is not a universal additional element where direct agreement evidence is offered. Under Monsanto (465 U.S. at 764) and Matsushita (475 U.S. at 588), circumstantial evidence must tend to exclude independent action.

interpretation

A tying arrangement constitutes an unreasonable restraint of trade if “the seller has ‘appreciable economic power’ in the tying product market and if the arrangement affects a substantial volume of commerce in the tied market.”

Systemcare, Inc. v. Wang Laboratories Corp. — 117 F.3d 1137 (1997) · United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit · 1997 (15usc1: author: Fable · not independently reviewed)

A tying arrangement constitutes an unreasonable restraint of trade if “the seller has ‘appreciable economic power’ in the tying product market and if the arrangement affects a substantial volume of commerce in the tied market.”

Because every commercial contract restrains trade in some literal sense, § 1 outlaws only *unreasonable* restraints of trade (Standard Oil Co. v. United States, 221 U.S. 1 (1911); State Oil Co. v. Khan, 522 U.S. 3, 10 (1997)), evaluated via one of three analytical modes (`restraint.per-se`, `restraint.quick-look`, or `restraint.rule-of-reason`).

interpretation

A tying arrangement constitutes an unreasonable restraint of trade if “the seller has ‘appreciable economic power’ in the tying product market and if the arrangement affects a substantial volume of commerce in the tied market.”

Systemcare, Inc. v. Wang Laboratories Corp. — 117 F.3d 1137 (1997) · United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit · 1997 (15usc1: author: Fable · not independently reviewed)

A tying arrangement constitutes an unreasonable restraint of trade if “the seller has ‘appreciable economic power’ in the tying product market and if the arrangement affects a substantial volume of commerce in the tied market.”

Under Summit Health, Ltd. v. Pinhas (500 U.S. 322 (1991)) and McLain v. Real Estate Board of New Orleans (444 U.S. 232 (1980)), satisfied if the restraint is either "in" interstate commerce or concerns general business activities that have a "not insubstantial effect" on interstate commerce (and for foreign commerce, subject to the Foreign Trade Antitrust Improvements Act, 15 U.S.C. § 6a).