Conti 11. Container Schiffarts-GMBH & Co. KG M.S. v. MSC Mediterranean Shipping Co. S.A., 91 F.4th 789 (5th Cir. 2024)[1] Factual Background In November 2000, Mediterranean Shipping Company (“MSC”), a Swiss corporation based in Geneva, chartered M/V FLAMINIA, a cargo vessel, from Conti, a German corporation. The charter agreement required all disputes arising thereunder to be arbitrated in London. From 2000 to 2012, MSC operated the FLAMINIA without issue. In June 2012, a Houston-based employee of…

Grupo Unidos por el Canal, S.A. v. Autoridad del Canal de Panama, 78 F.4th 1252 (11th Cir. 2023)[1] Factual Background Grupo Unidos por el Canal (“Grupo Unidos”) is a consortium of European companies that was awarded a multi-billion dollar construction contract by Autoridad del Canal de Panama (“Autoridad del Canal”) to expand the Panama Canal. When Grupo Unidos completed the expansion twenty months past the deadline, liability disputes followed. Pursuant to the contract’s arbitration clause, any…

First Kuwaiti Gen. Trading & Contracting W.L.L. v. Kellogg Brown & Root Int’l, Inc., No. 1:23-mc-1 (E.D. Va. May 12, 2023)[1] Factual Background Petitioner First Kuwaiti General Trading & Contracting W.L.L. (“FKTC”) and Respondent Kellogg Brown & Root International, Inc. (“KBR”) entered into various logistics contracts during the invasion of Iraq in 2003. FKTC experienced increased costs while performing some of the work, which was memorialized by two change orders, and KBR agreed to reimburse…

In Equicare Health Inc. v. Varian Med. Sys.,[1] the District Court for the Northern District of California vacated arbitration award due to evident partiality because one of the arbitrators failed to disclose that he was a former client of the attorneys for one of the parties to the arbitration. Factual Background Equicare Health Inc. (“Equicare”) and Varian Medical Systems, Inc. (“Varian”) entered into a contract under which Varian agreed to make a “reasonable commercial effort”…