Comtech Telecommunications Corp. v. Eusebia, Ltd.

• Court: District Court, S.D. New York
• Decided: December 9, 2019
• Docket: 1:19-cv-06694
• Status: Unknown

Opinion

DOCUMENT ELECTRONICALLY FILED UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT DOCH#: SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF NEW YORK DATE FILED: | 2/7 [ (9

COMTECH TELECOMMUNICATIONS CORP. and TELECOMMUNICATION SYSTEMS, INC., Plaintiffs, No. 19-CV-6694 (RA) ORDER EUSEBIA, LTD. f/k/a VIDEODOC TECHNOLOGIES, LTD, Defendant.

RONNIE ABRAMS, United States District Judge: On December 6, 2019, Plaintiffs filed a motion for default judgment against Defendant. See Dkt. 38. Plaintiffs also filed various exhibits in connection with their motion for default judgment. Plaintiffs now seek to file under seal two of those exhibits: (1) the Virtumedix® Provider Partner Agreement, dated May 24, 2015, and (2) the Virtumedix® API License Agreement, dated August 31, 2017. See Dkt. 36. Under the standard set forth in Lugosch v. Pyramid Co. of Onondaga, 435 F.3d 110 (2d Cir. 2006), this request is denied without prejudice. This is a breach of contract action that, as Plaintiffs acknowledge in their letter, arises out of the two License Agreements. “The Second Circuit has held that ‘documents submitted to a court for its consideration ina... motion are—as a matter of law—judicial documents to which a strong presumption of [immediate pubic] access attaches, under both the common law and the First Amendment.” Kavanagh vy. Zwilling, 997 F. Supp. 2d 241, 255-56 (S.D.N.Y. 2014) (quoting Lugosch, 435 F.3d at 126). Thus, as these exhibits are submitted with Plaintiffs’ motion for default judgment, the presumption of judicial access is strong. Moreover, Plaintiffs seek to

seal the entirety of these two License Agreements, but do not identify the reasons why sealing is justified under the Lugosch standard. Although sealing may be proper with respect certain confidential and/or business information, “the fact that the parties have designated certain documents as confidential among themselves does not mean that they have rebutted the “strong presumption of public access to court records’ that exists in federal courts.” NRW, Inc. v. Bindra, No. 12 Civ. 8555, 2013 WL 12353961, at *1 (S.D.N.Y. Oct. 24, 2013); see also Turner Network Sales, Inc. v. DISH Network L.L.C., No. 17-CV-7599 (RA), 2019 WL 147372, at *2 (S.D.N.Y. Jan. 9, 2019) (denying parties’ unopposed motions to seal after “[h]aving weighed the extremely high presumption of access that attaches to these judicial documents against the important, but lesser, interests of the litigants in maintaining their competitive standing”). Should Plaintiffs still seek to seal the entirety of the two License Agreements, no later than December 16, 2019, they shall provide the Court with the reasoning for why sealing is appropriate under the Lugosch standard. Should Plaintiffs wish to instead submit proposed redactions more narrowly tailored to the interests they seek to protect, they shall do so no later than December 16, 2019, and they shall also provide the Court with the reasoning for why such redactions are appropriate under the Lugosch standard. SO ORDERED. : a Dated: December 9, 2019 ; New York, New York (

United States District Judge