Chinese Tire Companies Ask to File Separate Briefs at CAFC in Case on State Control Analysis

Chinese tire exporters Guizhou Tyre Co. and Aeolus Tyre Co. asked the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit to waive the requirement that they file a joint brief in an antidumping duty case or, in the alternative, sever the consolidated action for the two companies. The exporters said that the "good cause" prompting this action is that both exporters are currently adherent to the word limit for a single brief even though both of their cases rest on entirely unique fact patterns (Guizhou Tyre Co. v. United States, Fed. Cir. # 23-2163).

Additionally, both companies have "completely separate [business proprietary information] records which constitute a sizable portion of the record," putting serious stress on the 50 confidential words limit the court sets on an individual brief. The prejudice that the companies would experience from continuing to litigate the case together "will outweigh any inconvenience to the only other party to this action."

The appellate court on Nov. 13 stayed the briefing schedule pending its consideration of the motion.

Guizhou Tyre and Aeolus are contesting the Commerce Department's finding that neither company rebutted the presumption of Chinese government control in the 2014-15 review of the AD order on new pneumatic off-the-road tires from China. In a pair of opening briefs, the companies said that Commerce's analysis of whether a company from a non-market economy has rebutted the presumption of foreign state control was improperly applied to exporters that are minority owned by state-owned enterprises (see 2310310048).

Both companies said Commerce instead should have considered all four factors relating to the presumption of foreign state control and not just the "truncated analysis" of whether potential control over export activities via control of management selection was in play.