Bristol-Myers Squibb Company Petitioner v. the Superior Court of San Francisco County, Respondent; Bracy Anderson…

Summary

The court held that California courts could not exercise general jurisdiction over Bristol-Myers Squibb because its California operations did not render it essentially at home there. It nevertheless held that specific jurisdiction existed over the nonresident plaintiffs' Plavix claims because BMS purposefully conducted extensive California activities substantially connected to the same nationwide marketing, distribution, research, and development course of conduct underlying all the claims, and BMS did not show that exercising jurisdiction was unreasonable. Justice Werdegar, dissenting, would have held that the nonresident plaintiffs' claims lacked a substantial connection to BMS's California activities.