The Court of Appeal has struck out an appeal by Moneer Omar Thabit Trading Est. over the lifting of a stay on Microsoft Ireland Operations Limited’s judgment, ruling that the dispute had become moot after Moneer’s counterclaim was dismissed in the High Court.
The appeal concerned a High Court order made by Mr Justice Noonan on 6 February 2019. That order lifted a stay on enforcement of a 2015 judgment for Microsoft for US$829,720.64, plus costs. The stay had been imposed to allow Moneer to pursue a counterclaim and set-off.
Moneer’s counterclaim alleged that Microsoft had induced it to enter a retail distribution agreement with representations that it would become the sole distributor of certain Microsoft products in Saudi Arabia and that Microsoft would end its relationship with its existing distributor there. Moneer claimed losses of about US$6 million. These were allegations, not findings in the appeal judgment.
The High Court’s decision to lift the stay followed delays in progressing the counterclaim, including late discovery and expert reports. The Court of Appeal judgment recounted that the High Court had given Moneer further opportunities to advance the case and that it did not attend the counterclaim hearing on 14 January 2020. Mr Justice Meenan dismissed the counterclaim at that hearing and awarded Microsoft costs, to be assessed if the parties could not agree. No appeal was brought against that order, which remained in force.
The Court of Appeal said the 2015 stay depended on the counterclaim continuing. Once it was dismissed, the stay ended and there was no live controversy for the appeal about lifting it to resolve. The court also said there was no application before it to extend time to appeal the dismissal of the counterclaim, and expressed no view on whether any such application would succeed.
The court struck out the appeal as moot. It said this did not prevent Moneer from taking any step it might be advised to take concerning an application to set aside or appeal the January 2020 orders, if evidence or relevant facts supported such an application.