Federal Circuit Sends USC's Google Maps Patent Case From Texas to California
The US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit has ordered a patent case brought by the University of Southern California (USC) against Google to be moved out of the Western District of Texas. In a nonprecedential order dated 6 October 2026 (In re Google LLC, No. 2026-157), Judges Dyk, Mayer and Stark granted Google's petition for a writ of mandamus and directed transfer to the Northern District of California.
The case
USC sued Google in Austin, alleging that features of Google Earth, Google Maps and Google Street View infringe US Patent Nos. 8,206,929 and 8,264,504. Google, which is headquartered in the Northern District of California, asked Judge Alan Albright to transfer the case under 28 U.S.C. § 1404(a). He found that one factor slightly favoured transfer and the rest were neutral, and he denied the motion.
Why the appeals court stepped in
Mandamus is an extraordinary remedy, available only where a lower court's decision is clearly wrong. The panel found that standard met. According to the order and IPWatchdog's report, the key points were:
- Relevant prior-art software, on a CD, was located in Northern California.
- More non-party witnesses could be compelled to testify in Northern California (seven) than in Western Texas (five), and the named inventor lives in Northern California.
- The only meaningful link to Texas was some quality-assurance testing.
The court described the refusal to transfer as "patently erroneous".
Why it matters
The Western District of Texas was for several years the busiest patent venue in the United States, and the Federal Circuit has repeatedly used mandamus to move cases out of it. This order continues that line, and it applies even where the plaintiff is a university rather than a patent-assertion entity.
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