MEMORANDUM AND ORDER
This matter is before the court on the motion of CSU, L.L.C. (“CSU”) for reconsideration of the court’s April 8 and July 17, 1997 Orders (Doe. # 664) and the motion of Xerox Corporation (“Xerox”) for reconsideration of the court’s March 19 and 21, 1997 Orders (Doc. # 666). Both parties’ motions concern the legal, issue of whether Xerox’s unilateral refusal to license or sell its patented and copyrighted products may constitute a misuse defense to an infringement claim or unlawful exclusionary conduct under the antitrust laws.
The court originally held that Xerox’s refusal to deal could constitute misuse and exclusionary conduct.
See
Mar. 19 Mem. & Order at 7-16, 22; Mar. 21 Mem. & Order at 18-19. Xerox requested and the court granted reconsideration of this ruling with respect to Xerox’s patented products. On reconsideration, the court held that Xerox’s unilateral refusal to sell or license its patented products cannot constitute patent misuse or unlawful
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exclusionary conduct under the antitrust laws.
See
Apr. 8 Mem. & Order at 16-22. CSU requested reconsideration or, in the alternative, certification of the court’s April 8 order. On July 17, the court denied CSU’s motion for reconsideration, but granted CSU’s request to certify the April 8 order for interlocutory appeal.
See
July 17 Mem. & Order at 2-6. On September 8, the Federal Circuit declined to hear the appeal.
See CSU Holdings, Inc. v. Xerox Corp.,
Factual Background
The factual background of this matter has been set forth in the court’s previous orders. The following is a brief summary.
In 1984, Xerox developed its first “parts policy,” in which it declared it would not sell “parts which are unique to the ‘10’ Series products in memory writers” to any Independent Service Organization (“ISO”) unless the ISO also was an end-user of the product. In January 1987, the parts policy was expanded to apply to newer “9” Series models and all “10” Series copiers, plus all new Xerox products introduced after the effective date of the policy. '
In January 1989, Xerox tightened enforcement of its existing parts policies and cut off CSU’s direct purchase of restricted parts from Xerox. Xerox also implemented an “on-site end-user verification” procedure when certain ISOs or their customers ordered parts from Xerox. The policy, which was implemented in June 1989, initially applied solely to the six most successful ISOs, including CSU.
As a result of Xerox’s parts policies, CSU claims that it did not have an assured source of supply of parts necessary to service Xerox copiers and printers. CSU argues that it abandoned its expansion plans as a result of Xerox’s parts policies. To maintain its existing business, CSU used parts cannibalized from used Xerox equipment, parts obtained from other ISOs, and parts purchased through a limited number of customers. CSU also obtained parts from Rank Xerox, a majority-owned European affiliate of Xerox, for approximately one year, until Xerox forced Rank Xerox to stop selling parts to CSU and other ISOs.
In 1994, Xerox settled an antitrust lawsuit brought by a class of ISOs in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Texas (the “R&D Litigation”). CSU opted out of the R&D settlement on the same day it filed the instant action against Xerox. Pursuant to the R&D settlement, Xerox agreed to suspend its restrictive parts policy for a period of six and one-half years. The settlement also compelled Xerox to license diagnostic software, an essential component for service, for four and one-half years.
After the R&D settlement, CSU claims that Xerox intensified its efforts to use price as a weapon to defeat ISO competition in the service market. CSU alleges that Xerox intentionally set the prices of its patented parts at high íevels to act as a weapon against ISOs and to maintain Xerox’s monopoly of the service market. Xerox charges ISOs significant markups on its parts. Xerox does not charge its customers who also service their own machines (“self-servicers”) the same parts prices it charges ISOs. CSU argues that Xerox explicitly set the price of its patented parts, not to recoup its development costs, but to force ISOs to raise the prices they charge customers. CSU maintains that Xerox’s goal of its pricing strategy was to eliminate ISO competition and capture 100% of the service market.
CSU alleges in its complaint that Xerox violated the Sherman Act by seeking to eliminate ISOs generally and CSU particularly as competitors in the relevant service markets for high speed copiers and printers. CSU alleges that Xerox has engaged in abusive, exclusionary, and predatory conduct, by seeking to preempt business opportunities, refusing to deal with ISOs, denying essential facilities to ISOs or only providing them on unreasonable terms, and seeking to leverage *1134 its monopoly power in the relevant high volume equipment and parts markets to acquire and/or maintain monopoly power in the relevant service markets.
Xerox has asserted several defenses for its conduct. In the instant motions, Xerox contends that CSU has not suffered antitrust injury, because its alleged injury is attributable to Xerox’s lawful refusal to sell patented parts and copyrighted software. Xerox also claims that CSU cannot assert' a patent or copyright misuse defense to Xerox’s infringement counterclaims based on Xerox’s refusal to deal.
Analysis
To establish monopolization under section 2 of the Sherman Act, CSU must prove that (1) Xerox possessed monopoly power in the relevant market and (2) Xerox willfully acquired or maintained that monopoly power “as distinguished from growth or development as a consequence of a superior product, business acumen, or historic accident.”
Eastman Kodak Co. v. Image Tech. Servs., Inc.,
CSU’s primary basis for requesting reconsideration of our prior rulings and denial of Xerox’s motion for reconsideration is the Ninth Circuit’s recent decision in
Image Tech. Servs., Inc. v. Eastman Kodak Co. (“Kodak”),
I. A Single Patent Can Implicate Multiple Antitrust Markets.
We begin with a discussion of the distinction between a “patent monopoly” and
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an “economic monopoly.”
See American Hoist & Derrick Co. v. Sowa & Sons, Inc.,
We believe that the Ninth Circuit in
Kodak,
in reaching its conclusion, implicitly assumed that a single patent can create at most a single “inherent” economic monopoly.
The patent statute illustrates that a patent holder’s unilateral refusal to deal cannot constitute unlawful leveraging of monopoly power. The Patent Reform Act of 1988 added subsection 271(d)(4), which provides:
No patent owner otherwise entitled to relief for infringement or contributory infringement shall be denied relief or deemed guilty of misuse or illegal extension of the patent right by reason of having ... refused to license or use any rights to the patent.
35 U.S.C. § 271(d)(4) (emphasis added). The Ninth Circuit in
Kodak
and CSU maintain that this statutory provision only bars a misuse defense to an infringement claim but does not preclude antitrust claims premised on a unilateral refusal to license a patented work.
The Ninth Circuit in
Kodak
and CSU assume, without discussion, that a single patent (or “patent monopoly”) can be equated with a single relevant antitrust market. Although most patented inventions likely will be marketed in a single antitrust market, some inventions may be useful in multiple markets. The Ninth Circuit’s holding would discourage the invention of such products. Inventors rarely could refuse to license their products without fear that they had not properly defined the relevant antitrust market or considered how the relevant markets may be defined in the future.
See
Apr. 8 Mem. & Order at 18-19;
SCM,
We believe that a patent holder can lawfully acquire more than one “inherent” or “economic” monopoly by exercising the exclusionary power of a single patent. The court is not aware of any patent which states that it confers a monopoly in a particular antitrust market. Patents only claim inventions. Because each use of that invention may be prevented by the patent holder, the patent may have some anticompetitive effect in each market in which it is used or not used.
See
Apr. 8 Mem. & Order at 20 n. 5. The patent statute expressly grants patent holders the right to exclude others from manufacturing, selling, or using their inventions.
See
35 U.S.C. § 154 (“Every patent shall contain ... a grant to the patentee, his heirs or assigns, for the term of seventeen years ... the right to exclude others from making, using, or selling the invention”);
see also
35 U.S.C. § 271(d) (no patent holder shall be deemed guilty of misuse or illegal extension of the patent right by refusing to license or use any rights to the patent). Manufacturing, retail, and service markets all fall within this statutory grant of power to patent holders. Thus, Congress, by enacting the patent statute, apparently contemplated that a single patent could implicate more than one market. Courts also have allowed patent holders to exercise the exclusive power of a
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patent in multiple markets.
See Miller Insi-tuform,
CSU argues that the Ninth Circuit’s decision in
Kodak
is supported by a number of cases that have held that patent holders are not immune from the antitrust laws.
See Zenith Radio Corp. v. Hazeltine Research, Inc.,
In essence, CSU maintains that Xerox achieved too much success — monopoly power in two antitrust markets — by exercising its rights inherent in the patent grant. With the exception of the district court and the Ninth Circuit in
Kodak,
however, courts consistently have held that a patent holder’s right to exclude others from using its patented invention is not conditioned on the economic success or failure of the patent holder.
See Dawson,
The rationale of the patent system mandates that a patent holder’s right to exclude cannot be limited by the definition of the relevant antitrust markets. “The federal patent system [ ] embodies a carefully crafted bargain for encouraging the creation and disclosure of new, useful, and nonobvious advances in technology and design in return for the exclusive right to practice the invention for a period of years.”
Bonito Boats, Inc. v. Thunder Craft Boats, Inc.,
In
Kodak,
the Ninth Circuit also directed that the district court modify its injunction to eliminate the requirement that Kodak must sell its patented and copyrighted products at reasonable prices. The court acknowledged that “Kodak is entitled to monopoly prices on its patented and copyrighted parts.” -125 F.Bd at 1225. The modified injunction allows Kodak to charge “any nondiscriminatory price that the market will bear.”
Id.
at 1225-26. The Ninth Circuit’s treatment of the injunction is fundamentally inconsistent with its holding regarding the lawfulness of Kodak’s refusal to license its intellectual property. As we have noted elsewhere, “[a] royalty demand which is so high as to preclude acceptance of a license offer is, after all, not appreciably different from a refusal to license upon any terms.”
W.L. Gore,
Finally, CSU attempts to analogize this case to
Aspen Skiing Co. v. Aspen Highlands Skiing Corp.,
For all of the above reasons, we hold that if a patent is lawfully acquired, a patent holder’s unilateral refusal to sell or license its patented invention does not constitute unlawful exclusionary conduct under the antitrust laws even if the refusal impacts competition in more than one relevant antitrust market.
*1140 II. A Patent Holder’s Intent In Refusing To Deal Is Irrelevant.
In
Kodak,
the Ninth Circuit held that a patent holder’s refusal to deal is a presumptively valid business justification for any harm to consumers, but such a presumption may be rebutted by evidence that the patent holder’s refusal to deal was not truly based on a desire to protect its intellectual property rights.
CSU argues that by accepting Xerox’s position, the court would have to hold that intent is not a fundamental issue under Section 2 of the Sherman Act. Intent to monopolize certainly is an essential element of a Section 2 claim, however, proof of intent to monopolize cannot transform a patent holder’s unilateral refusal to deal into unlawful exclusionary conduct. The Supreme Court has held that a patent holder’s subjective motivation for excluding others from use of an invention is irrelevant. In
Continental Paper Bag,
the Court stated: “As to the suggestion that competitors were excluded from the use of the new patent, we answer that such exclusion may be said to have been of the very essence of the right conferred by the patent, as it is the privilege of any owner of property to use or not use it,
without question of motive.”
A patent holder’s intent in exercising its exclusionary power is irrelevant because the right to exclude competitors from using an invention is expressly authorized by law. In
United States v. Rock Royal Co-op.,
The standard articulated by the Ninth Circuit in Kodak makes it very difficult for a jury, a judge, or even the patent holder, to distinguish between a permissible refusal to deal (based on a desire to profit from and protect patent rights) and an impermissible refusal to deal (apparently based on a desire to obtain a competitive advantage by excluding competitors). A patent holder does not refuse to share its invention because the property is patented, rather, the refusal is based on a desire to obtain a competitive advantage. See 3 Areeda & Hovenkamp ¶ 705b at 156 (“[N]o commercial firm invents except with the hope of prevailing over its-rivals. And no one can apply for a patent without knowingly intending to acquire the legal power to exclude — that is the entire point of the patent grant. As á result, the inventor’s intent rarely or never provides a guide to determining liability.”). The patent is merely the means by which its holder may obtain this competitive advantage. To classify the desire to obtain a competitive advantage over competitors as pretext is to read the right to exclude out of the patent statute. Under the Kodak standard, a self-serving memorandum in the files of a corporate executive, which states that the company is refusing to license its. products because they are patented, apparently could be sufficient to protect the company’s refusal to deal from antitrust scrutiny. On the other hand, a company would be subject to antitrust liability for having a corporate memorandum which states that the company plans to use its intellectual property rights to exclude competitors and achieve a competitive advantage in the marketplace. The monopolist’s conduct, as well as the anticompetitive effect on the relevant markets, is identical in both circumstances. We decline to adopt a rule imposing antitrust liability based on such fine line distinctions of subjective intent. In essence, the difference between protected and unprotected conduct under Kodak is based on whether the company engaged in the formalistic ritual of documenting that “our patent rights is what truly is motivating our refusal to deal.” 4 For the above reasons and given that nearly all commercial research is based on mixed motivations, we conclude that a patent holder is not required to proffer a legitimate business justification to avoid antitrust liability for exercising its right to refuse to sell or license a patented invention. See 3 Areeda & Hovenkamp ¶ 705 at 156-57.
III. A Patent Holder’s Other Activities Are Not Relevant In Determining The Lawfulness Of Its Refusal To Deal.
We held in our previous orders that Xerox’s refusal to license its patented products cannot be transformed into unlawful conduct merely because of Xerox’s other alleged exclusionary acts.
See
July 17 Mem.
&
Order at 6. CSU argues that assuming Xerox’s refusal to sell patented products is otherwise lawful, such conduct may be illegal if Xerox engaged in other unlawful exclusionary acts. CSU maintains that otherwise lawful conduct, when combined with unlawful acts pursuant to a scheme to monopolize, may violate-Section 2 of. the Sherman Act. The key to our April 8 .and July 17 rulings, however, is that Xerox’s refusal to license is expressly authorized by patent law and therefore immune from antitrust scrutiny. This result is compelled by the holdings of
SCM, Miller Insituform,
and
Westinghouse. See, e.g., SCM,
Conduct expressly authorized by one law or governmental agency cannot be simultaneously subject to antitrust scrutiny. The Supreme Court in
Rock Royal
held that if the milk cooperative law and order of the Secretary of Agriculture were “otherwise valid, the fact that their effect would be to give cooperatives a monopoly of the market would not violate the Sherman Act.”
CSU’s proposed rule allowing a plaintiff to combine a defendant’s lawful and unlawful activities effectively would eliminate the requirement that an antitrust plaintiff must show a “casual connection between the [defendant’s] antitrust violations and [plaintiff’s] injury.”
Continental Ore,
IV. A Copyright Holder Can Unilaterally Refuse To Sell Or License Its Copyrighted Materials.
The principles behind the Patent and Copyright Acts are the same: to encourage the development of works that promote consumer welfare in the long term by granting exclusive rights to the inventor or author.
See Mazer v. Stein,
We found previously that Xerox’s unilateral refusal to license or sell its copyrighted products could constitute unlawful exclusionary conduct if the scope of Xerox’s copyrights is limited to the parts market and there are separate antitrust markets for parts and service.
See
Mar. 21 Mem. & Order at 18-19. This rule of law could effectively limit the scope of a copyright holder’s protection to a single relevant antitrust market. A copyright holder, however, receives protection for his “expression.” A copyright holder “may refrain from vending or licensing [its product] and content [itself] with simply exercising the right to exclude others from using [its] property.”
Data General,
CSU argues that a refusal to license a copyright cannot be treated in the same manner as a refusal to license a patent because the Copyright Act does not contain a similar statutory provision to section 271(d)(4) of the Patent Act. CSU maintains that section 271(d)(4) was a principal basis of our prior holding regarding patents. Although section 271(d)(4) lends additional support and is consistent with our ruling on patents, we would reach the same result in the absence of section 271(d)(4). See, e.g., SCM, supra (decided before section 271(d)(4) was added); Miller Insituform, supra (same).
*1144 For all of the above reasons, we hold that if a copyright is lawfully acquired, a copyright holder’s unilateral refusal to sell or license its copyrighted expression does not constitute unlawful exclusionary conduct under the antitrust laws or copyright misuse. A copyright holder can exercise its right to exclude others from using the protected expression, even if the exclusion impacts competition in more than one relevant antitrust market. A copyright holder’s intent and any other alleged exclusionary acts are irrelevant in determining the lawfulness of a unilateral refusal to license a copyright.
IT IS THEREFORE ORDERED that the motion of CSU, L.L.C., for reconsideration of the court’s April 8 and July 17, 1997 orders (Doc. # 664) is denied.
IT IS FURTHER ORDERED that Xerox’s motion for reconsideration of the court’s March 19 and 21, 1997 Orders (Doc. # 666) is granted. The court’s March 19 and 21, 1997 Orders (Doc. 571 and 572) are modified as discussed herein.
Notes
. If CSU can establish an antitrust violation with respect to Xerox's refusal to license its copyrights, the same evidence likely will establish copyright misuse, which is CSU’s primary defense to Xerox’s copyright infringement counterclaim.
See
Mar. 21 Mem. & Order at 17-18 (citing
Lasercomb, Am., Inc. v. Reynolds,
. In
Data General,
the First Circuit expressed some doubt about the applicability of
Aspen Skiing
in the area of intellectual property but assumed for purposes of the opinion that the exclusionary withdrawal of assistance could overcome, in certain circumstances, the presumption that a refusal to license a copyright is not exclusionary.
. CSU argues that we should follow the First Circuit’s rationale in Data General, and adopt only a rebuttable presumption that Xerox's refusal to license patented and copyrighted products is lawful. Even under the First Circuit’s standard, however, we would find for Xerox as a matter of law because imposing liability in this case likely would frustrate the purposes of the Patent and Copyright Acts. See id. at 1187 n. 64 ("we do not hold that an antitrust plaintiff can never rebut this presumption, for there may be rare cases in which imposing antitrust liability is unlikely to frustrate the objectives of the Copyright Act”).
. Actually, it is unclear from the Kodak opinion exactly what documented reason would be sufficient to justify a refusal to deal. Accordingly, patent holders could rarely refuse to sell their patented products with any comfort that they are in compliance with the law.
