Daimler AG v. Bauman

1 One plaintiff is a resident of Argentina and a citizen of Chile; all other plaintiffs are residents and citizens of Argentina.

3 At times relevant to this suit, MBUSA was wholly owned by DaimlerChrysler North America Holding Corporation, a Daimler subsidiary.

5 Colloquy at oral argument illustrated the respective provinces of general and specific jurisdiction over persons. Two hypothetical scenarios were posed: First, if a California plaintiff, injured in a California accident involving a Daimler-manufactured vehicle, sued Daimler in California court alleging that the vehicle was defectively designed, that court's adjudicatory authority would be premised on specific jurisdiction. See Tr. of Oral Arg. 11 (Daimler's counsel acknowledged that specific jurisdiction "may well be ... available" in such a case, depending on whether Daimler purposefully availed itself of the forum). Second, if a similar accident took place in Poland and injured Polish plaintiffs sued Daimler in California court, the question would be one of general jurisdiction. See id., at 29 (on plaintiffs' view, Daimler would be amenable to such a suit in California).

6 See Shaffer v. Heitner, 433 U.S. 186 , 204, 97 S.Ct. 2569 , 53 L.Ed.2d 683 (1977) ("The immediate effect of [ International Shoe 's ] departure from Pennoyer 's conceptual apparatus was to increase the ability of the state courts to obtain personal jurisdiction over nonresident defendants."); McGee v. International Life Ins. Co., 355 U.S. 220 , 222, 78 S.Ct. 199 , 2 L.Ed.2d 223 (1957) ("[A] trend is clearly discernible toward expanding the permissible scope of state jurisdiction over foreign corporations and other nonresidents."). For an early codification, see Uniform Interstate and International Procedure Act § 1.02 (describing jurisdiction based on "[e]nduring [r]elationship" to encompass a person's domicile or a corporation's place of incorporation or principal place of business, and providing that "any ... claim for relief" may be brought in such a place), § 1.03 (describing jurisdiction "[b]ased upon [c]onduct," limited to claims arising from the enumerated acts, e.g., "transacting any business in th[e] state," "contracting to supply services or things in th[e] state," or "causing tortious injury by an act or omission in th[e] state"), 9B U.L.A. 308, 310 (1966).

7 See, e.g., Asahi Metal Industry Co. v. Superior Court of Cal., Solano Cty., 480 U.S. 102 , 112, 107 S.Ct. 1026 , 94 L.Ed.2d 92 (1987) (opinion of O'Connor, J.) (specific jurisdiction may lie over a foreign defendant that places a product into the "stream of commerce" while also "designing the product for the market in the forum State, advertising in the forum State, establishing channels for providing regular advice to customers in the forum State, or marketing the product through a distributor who has agreed to serve as the sales agent in the forum State"); World-Wide Volkswagen Corp. v. Woodson, 444 U.S. 286 , 297, 100 S.Ct. 559 , 62 L.Ed.2d 490 (1980) ("[I]f the sale of a product of a manufacturer or distributor such as Audi or Volkswagen is not simply an isolated occurrence, but arises from the efforts of the manufacturer or distributor to serve, directly or indirectly, the market for its product in other States, it is not unreasonable to subject it to suit in one of those States if its allegedly defective merchandise has there been the source of injury to its owner or to others."); Calder v. Jones, 465 U.S. 783 , 789-790, 104 S.Ct. 1482 , 79 L.Ed.2d 804 (1984) (California court had specific jurisdiction to hear suit brought by California plaintiff where Florida-based publisher of a newspaper having its largest circulation in California published an article allegedly defaming the complaining Californian; under those circumstances, defendants "must 'reasonably anticipate being haled into [a California] court' "); Keeton v. Hustler Magazine, Inc., 465 U.S. 770 , 780-781, 104 S.Ct. 1473 , 79 L.Ed.2d 790 (1984) (New York resident may maintain suit for libel in New Hampshire state court against California-based magazine that sold 10,000 to 15,000 copies in New Hampshire each month; as long as the defendant "continuously and deliberately exploited the New Hampshire market," it could reasonably be expected to answer a libel suit there).

8 Selectively referring to the trial court record in Perkins (as summarized in an opinion of the intermediate appellate court), Justice SOTOMAYOR posits that Benguet may have had extensive operations in places other than Ohio. See post, at 769 - 770, n. 8 (opinion concurring in judgment) ("By the time the suit [in Perkins ] was commenced, the company had resumed its considerable operations in the Philippines," "rebuilding its properties there" and "purchasing machinery, supplies and equipment." (internal quotation marks omitted)). See also post, at 767, n. 5 (many of the corporation's "key management decisions" were made by the out-of-state purchasing agent and chief of staff). Justice SOTOMAYOR's account overlooks this Court's opinion in Perkins and the point on which that opinion turned: All of Benguet's activities were directed by the company's president from within Ohio. See Perkins v. Benguet Consol. Mining Co., 342 U.S. 437 , 447-448, 72 S.Ct. 413 , 96 L.Ed. 485 (1952) (company's Philippine mining operations "were completely halted during the occupation ... by the Japanese"; and the company's president, from his Ohio office, "supervised policies dealing with the rehabilitation of the corporation's properties in the Philippines and ... dispatched funds to cover purchases of machinery for such rehabilitation"). On another day, Justice SOTOMAYOR joined a unanimous Court in recognizing: "To the extent that the company was conducting any business during and immediately after the Japanese occupation of the Philippines, it was doing so in Ohio...." Goodyear Dunlop Tires Operations, S.A. v. Brown, 564 U.S. ----, ----, 131 S.Ct. 2846 , 2856, 180 L.Ed.2d 796 (2011). Given the wartime circumstances, Ohio could be considered "a surrogate for the place of incorporation or head office." von Mehren & Trautman 1144. See also ibid. ( Perkins "should be regarded as a decision on its exceptional facts, not as a significant reaffirmation of obsolescing notions of general jurisdiction" based on nothing more than a corporation's "doing business" in a forum). Justice SOTOMAYOR emphasizes Perkins ' statement that Benguet's Ohio contacts, while "continuous and systematic," were but a "limited ... part of its general business." 342 U.S., at 438 , 72 S.Ct. 413 . Describing the company's "wartime activities" as "necessarily limited," id., at 448 , 72 S.Ct. 413 , however, this Court had in mind the diminution in operations resulting from the Japanese occupation and the ensuing shutdown of the company's Philippine mines. No fair reader of the full opinion in Perkins could conclude that the Court meant to convey anything other than that Ohio was the center of the corporation's wartime activities. But cf. post, at 768 ("If anything, [ Perkins ] intimated that the defendant's Ohio contacts were not substantial in comparison to its contacts elsewhere.").

10 Remarkably, Justice SOTOMAYOR treats specific jurisdiction as though it were barely there. Given the many decades in which specific jurisdiction has flourished, it would be hard to conjure up an example of the "deep injustice" Justice SOTOMAYOR predicts as a consequence of our holding that California is not an all-purpose forum for suits against Daimler. Post, at 771. Justice SOTOMAYOR identifies "the concept of reciprocal fairness" as the "touchstone principle of due process in this field." Post, at 768 (citing International Shoe, 326 U.S., at 319 , 66 S.Ct. 154 ). She overlooks, however, that in the very passage of International Shoe on which she relies, the Court left no doubt that it was addressing specific-not general-jurisdiction. See id., at 319 , 66 S.Ct. 154 ("The exercise of th[e] privilege [of conducting corporate activities within a State] may give rise to obligations, and, so far as those obligations arise out of or are connected with the activities within the state, a procedure which requires the corporation to respond to a suit brought to enforce them can, in most instances, hardly be said to be undue." (emphasis added)).

11 As the Court made plain in Goodyear and repeats here, general jurisdiction requires affiliations "so 'continuous and systematic' as to render [the foreign corporation] essentially at home in the forum State." 564 U.S., at ----, 131 S.Ct., at 2851, i.e., comparable to a domestic enterprise in that State.

12 MBUSA is not a defendant in this case.

13 Agency relationships, we have recognized, may be relevant to the existence of specific jurisdiction. "[T]he corporate personality," International Shoe Co. v. Washington, 326 U.S. 310 , 66 S.Ct. 154 , 90 L.Ed. 95 (1945), observed, "is a fiction, although a fiction intended to be acted upon as though it were a fact." Id. , at 316, 66 S.Ct. 154 . See generally 1 W. Fletcher, Cyclopedia of the Law of Corporations § 30, p. 30 (Supp.2012-2013) ("A corporation is a distinct legal entity that can act only through its agents."). As such, a corporation can purposefully avail itself of a forum by directing its agents or distributors to take action there. See, e.g., Asahi, 480 U.S., at 112 , 107 S.Ct. 1026 (opinion of O'Connor, J.) (defendant's act of "marketing [a] product through a distributor who has agreed to serve as the sales agent in the forum State" may amount to purposeful availment); International Shoe, 326 U.S., at 318 , 66 S.Ct. 154 ("the commission of some single or occasional acts of the corporate agent in a state" may sometimes "be deemed sufficient to render the corporation liable to suit" on related claims). See also Brief for Petitioner 24 (acknowledging that "an agency relationship may be sufficient in some circumstances to give rise to specific jurisdiction"). It does not inevitably follow, however, that similar reasoning applies to general jurisdiction. Cf. Goodyear, 564 U.S., at ----, 131 S.Ct., at 2855 (faulting analysis that "elided the essential difference between case-specific and all-purpose (general) jurisdiction").

14 Indeed, plaintiffs do not defend this aspect of the Ninth Circuit's analysis. See Brief for Respondents 39, n. 18 ("We do not believe that this gloss is particularly helpful.").

17 International Shoe also recognized, as noted above, see supra, at 753 - 754, that "some single or occasional acts of the corporate agent in a state ..., because of their nature and quality and the circumstances of their commission, may be deemed sufficient to render the corporation liable to suit." 326 U.S., at 318 , 66 S.Ct. 154 .

18 Plaintiffs emphasize two decisions, Barrow S.S. Co. v. Kane, 170 U.S. 100 , 18 S.Ct. 526 , 42 L.Ed. 964 (1898), and Tauza v. Susquehanna Coal Co., 220 N.Y. 259 , 115 N.E. 915 (1917) (Cardozo, J.), both cited in Perkins v. Benguet Consol. Mining Co., 342 U.S. 437 , 72 S.Ct. 413 , 96 L.Ed. 485 (1952), just after the statement that a corporation's continuous operations in-state may suffice to establish general jurisdiction. Id., at 446, and n. 6, 72 S.Ct. 413 . See also International Shoe, 326 U.S., at 318 , 66 S.Ct. 154 (citing Tauza ). Barrow and Tauza indeed upheld the exercise of general jurisdiction based on the presence of a local office, which signaled that the corporation was "doing business" in the forum. Perkins' unadorned citations to these cases, both decided in the era dominated by Pennoyer 's territorial thinking, see supra, at 753 - 754, should not attract heavy reliance today. See generally Feder, Goodyear , "Home," and the Uncertain Future of Doing Business Jurisdiction, 63 S.C. L.Rev. 671 (2012) (questioning whether "doing business" should persist as a basis for general jurisdiction).

19 We do not foreclose the possibility that in an exceptional case, see, e.g., Perkins , described supra, at 755 - 757, and n. 8, a corporation's operations in a forum other than its formal place of incorporation or principal place of business may be so substantial and of such a nature as to render the corporation at home in that State. But this case presents no occasion to explore that question, because Daimler's activities in California plainly do not approach that level. It is one thing to hold a corporation answerable for operations in the forum State, see infra, at 763, quite another to expose it to suit on claims having no connection whatever to the forum State.

1 The Courts of Appeals have uniformly held that the reasonableness prong does in fact apply in the general jurisdiction context. See Metropolitan Life Ins. Co. v. Robertson-Ceco Corp. , 84 F.3d 560 , 573 (C.A.2 1996) ("[E]very circuit that has considered the question has held, implicitly or explicitly, that the reasonableness inquiry is applicable to all questions of personal jurisdiction, general or specific"); see also, e.g., Lakin v. Prudential Securities, Inc., 348 F.3d 704 , 713 (C.A.8 2003) ; Base Metal Trading, Ltd. v. OJSC "Novokuznetsky Aluminum Factory, " 283 F.3d 208 , 213-214 (C.A.4 2002) ; Trierweiler v. Croxton & Trench Holding Corp., 90 F.3d 1523 , 1533 (C.A.10 1996) ; Amoco Egypt Oil Co. v. Leonis Navigation Co., 1 F.3d 848 , 851, n. 2 (C.A.9 1993) ; Donatelli v. National Hockey League, 893 F.2d 459 , 465 (C.A.1 1990) ; Bearry v. Beech Aircraft Corp., 818 F.2d 370 , 377 (C.A.5 1987). Without the benefit of a single page of briefing on the issue, the majority casually adds each of these cases to the mounting list of decisions jettisoned as a consequence of today's ruling. See ante, at 762, n. 20.

3 The majority appears to suggest that Daimler may have presented the argument in its petition for rehearing en banc before the Ninth Circuit. See ante, at 752 (stating that Daimler "urg[ed] that the exercise of personal jurisdiction ... could not be reconciled with this Court's decision in Goodyear Dunlop Tires Operations, S.A. v. Brown, 564 U.S. ----, 131 S.Ct. 2846 , 180 L.Ed.2d 796 (2011)"). But Daimler's petition for rehearing did not argue what the Court holds today. The Court holds that Daimler's California contacts would be insufficient for general jurisdiction even assuming that MBUSA's contacts may be attributed to Daimler. Daimler's rehearing petition made a distinct argument-that attribution of MBUSA's contacts should not be permitted under an " 'agency' theory" because doing so would "rais[e] significant constitutional concerns" under Goodyear . Petition for Rehearing or Rehearing En Banc in No. 07-15386(CA9), p. 9.

6 While Helicopteros formulated the general jurisdiction inquiry as asking whether a foreign defendant possesses "continuous and systematic general business contacts," 466 U.S., at 416 , 104 S.Ct. 1868 , the majority correctly notes, ante, at 760, that International Shoe used the phrase "continuous and systematic" in the context of discussing specific jurisdiction, 326 U.S., at 317 , 66 S.Ct. 154 . But the majority recognizes that International Shoe separately described the type of contacts needed for general jurisdiction as "continuous corporate operations" that are "so substantial" as to justify suit on unrelated causes of action. Id. , at 318, 66 S.Ct. 154 . It is unclear why our precedents departed from International Shoe 's"continuous and substantial" formulation in favor of the "continuous and systematic" formulation, but the majority does not contend-nor do I perceive-that there is a material difference between the two.

8 The majority views the phrase "at home" as serving a different purpose-that of requiring a comparison between a defendant's in-state and out-of-state contacts. Ante, at 761, n. 20. That cannot be the correct understanding though, because among other things it would cast grave doubt on Perkins -a case that Goodyear pointed to as an exemplar of general jurisdiction, 564 U.S., at ----, 131 S.Ct., at 2855-2856. For if Perkins had applied the majority's newly minted proportionality test, it would have come out the other way. The majority apparently thinks that the Philippine corporate defendant in Perkins did not have meaningful operations in places other than Ohio. See ante, at 755 - 756, and n. 8. But one cannot get past the second sentence of Perkins before realizing that is wrong. That sentence reads: "The corporation has been carrying on in Ohio a continuous and systematic, but limited, part of its general business." 342 U.S., at 438 , 72 S.Ct. 413 . Indeed, the facts of the case set forth by the Ohio Court of Appeals show just how "limited" the company's Ohio contacts-which included a single officer keeping files and managing affairs from his Ohio home office-were in comparison with its "general business" operations elsewhere. By the time the suit was commenced, the company had resumed its considerable mining operations in the Philippines, " 'rebuilding its properties' " there and purchasing " 'machinery, supplies and equipment.' " 88 Ohio App., at 123-124 , 95 N.E.2d, at 8 . Moreover, the company employed key managers in other forums, including a purchasing agent in San Francisco and a chief of staff in the Philippines. Id., at 124 , 95 N.E.2d, at 8 . The San Francisco purchasing agent negotiated the purchase of the company's machinery and supplies " 'on the direction of the Company's Chief of Staff in Manila,' " ibid., a fact that squarely refutes the majority's assertion that "[a]ll of Benguet's activities were directed by the company's president from within Ohio," ante, at 756, n. 8 . And the vast majority of the company's board of directors meetings took place outside Ohio, in locations such as Washington, New York, and San Francisco. 88 Ohio App., at 125 , 95 N.E.2d, at 8 . In light of these facts, it is all but impossible to reconcile the result in Perkins with the proportionality test the majority announces today. Goodyear 's use of the phrase "at home" is thus better understood to require the same general jurisdiction inquiry that Perkins required: An out-of-state business must have the kind of continuous and substantial in-state presence that a parallel local company would have.

9 I accept at face value the majority's declaration that general jurisdiction is not limited to a corporation's place of incorporation and principal place of business because "a corporation's operations in a forum other than its formal place of incorporation or principal place of business may be so substantial and of such a nature as to render the corporation at home in that State." Ante, at 761, n. 19; see also ante, at 761. Were that not so, our analysis of the defendants' in-state contacts in Perkins v. Benguet Consol. Mining Co., 342 U.S. 437 , 72 S.Ct. 413 , 96 L.Ed. 485 (1952), Helicopteros Nacionales de Colombia, S.A. v. Hall, 466 U.S. 408 , 104 S.Ct. 1868 , 80 L.Ed.2d 404 (1984), and Goodyear would have been irrelevant, as none of the defendants in those cases was sued in its place of incorporation or principal place of business.

11 See also, e.g., Woods v. Nova Companies Belize Ltd., 739 So.2d 617 , 620-621 (Fla.App.1999) (estate of decedent killed in an overseas plane crash permitted to sue responsible Belizean corporate defendant in Florida courts, rather than Belizean courts, based on defendant's continuous and systematic business contacts in Florida).

12 The present case and the examples posited involve foreign corporate defendants, but the principle announced by the majority would apply equally to preclude general jurisdiction over a U.S. company that is incorporated and has its principal place of business in another U.S. State. Under the majority's rule, for example, a General Motors autoworker who retires to Florida would be unable to sue GM in that State for disabilities that develop from the retiree's labor at a Michigan parts plant, even though GM undertakes considerable business operations in Florida. See Twitchell, The Myth of General Jurisdiction, 101 Harv. L.Rev. 610 , 670 (1988). * * *

2 Daimler was restructured in 2007 and is now known as Daimler AG. No party contends that any postsuit corporate reorganization bears on our disposition of this case. This opinion refers to members of the Daimler corporate family by the names current at the time plaintiffs filed suit.

4 International Shoe was an action by the State of Washington to collect payments to the State's unemployment fund. Liability for the payments rested on in-state activities of resident sales solicitors engaged by the corporation to promote its wares in Washington. See 326 U.S., at 313-314 , 66 S.Ct. 154 .

9 See generally von Mehren & Trautman 1177-1179. See also Twitchell, The Myth of General Jurisdiction, 101 Harv. L.Rev. 610 , 676 (1988) ("[W]e do not need to justify broad exercises of dispute-blind jurisdiction unless our interpretation of the scope of specific jurisdiction unreasonably limits state authority over nonresident defendants."); Borchers, The Problem With General Jurisdiction, 2001 U. Chi. Legal Forum 119, 139 ("[G]eneral jurisdiction exists as an imperfect safety valve that sometimes allows plaintiffs access to a reasonable forum in cases when specific jurisdiction would deny it.").

15 The Ninth Circuit's agency analysis also looked to whether the parent enjoys "the right to substantially control" the subsidiary's activities. Bauman v. DaimlerChrysler Corp., 644 F.3d 909 , 924 (2011). The Court of Appeals found the requisite "control" demonstrated by the General Distributor Agreement between Daimler and MBUSA, which gives Daimler the right to oversee certain of MBUSA's operations, even though that agreement expressly disavowed the creation of any agency relationship. Thus grounded, the separate inquiry into control hardly curtails the overbreadth of the Ninth Circuit's agency holding.

16 By addressing this point, Justice SOTOMAYOR asserts, we have strayed from the question on which we granted certiorari to decide an issue not argued below. Post, at 765 - 766. That assertion is doubly flawed. First, the question on which we granted certiorari, as stated in Daimler's petition, is "whether it violates due process for a court to exercise general personal jurisdiction over a foreign corporation based solely on the fact that an indirect corporate subsidiary performs services on behalf of the defendant in the forum State." Pet. for Cert. i. That question fairly encompasses an inquiry into whether, in light of Goodyear , Daimler can be considered at home in California based on MBUSA's in-state activities. See also this Court's Rule 14.1(a) (a party's statement of the question presented "is deemed to comprise every subsidiary question fairly included therein"). Moreover, both in the Ninth Circuit, see, e.g., Brief for Federation of German Industries et al. as Amici Curiae in No. 07-15386(CA9), p. 3, and in this Court, see, e.g., U.S. Brief 13-18; Brief for Chamber of Commerce of United States of America et al. as Amici Curiae 6-23; Brief for Lea Brilmayer as Amica Curiae 10-12, amici in support of Daimler homed in on the insufficiency of Daimler's California contacts for general jurisdiction purposes. In short, and in light of our pathmarking opinion in Goodyear , we perceive no unfairness in deciding today that California is not an all-purpose forum for claims against Daimler.

20 To clarify in light of Justice SOTOMAYOR's opinion concurring in the judgment, the general jurisdiction inquiry does not "focu[s] solely on the magnitude of the defendant's in-state contacts." Post, at 767. General jurisdiction instead calls for an appraisal of a corporation's activities in their entirety, nationwide and worldwide. A corporation that operates in many places can scarcely be deemed at home in all of them. Otherwise, "at home" would be synonymous with "doing business" tests framed before specific jurisdiction evolved in the United States. See von Mehren & Trautman 1142-1144. Nothing in International Shoe and its progeny suggests that "a particular quantum of local activity" should give a State authority over a "far larger quantum of ... activity" having no connection to any in-state activity. Feder, supra, at 694. Justice SOTOMAYOR would reach the same result, but for a different reason. Rather than concluding that Daimler is not at home in California, Justice SOTOMAYOR would hold that the exercise of general jurisdiction over Daimler would be unreasonable "in the unique circumstances of this case." Post, at 763. In other words, she favors a resolution fit for this day and case only. True, a multipronged reasonableness check was articulated in Asahi, 480 U.S., at 113-114 , 107 S.Ct. 1026 , but not as a free-floating test. Instead, the check was to be essayed when specific jurisdiction is at issue. See also Burger King Corp. v. Rudzewicz, 471 U.S. 462 , 476-478, 105 S.Ct. 2174 , 85 L.Ed.2d 528 (1985). First, a court is to determine whether the connection between the forum and the episode-in-suit could justify the exercise of specific jurisdiction. Then, in a second step, the court is to consider several additional factors to assess the reasonableness of entertaining the case. When a corporation is genuinely at home in the forum State, however, any second-step inquiry would be superfluous. Justice SOTOMAYOR fears that our holding will "lead to greater unpredictability by radically expanding the scope of jurisdictional discovery." Post, at 770 - 771. But it is hard to see why much in the way of discovery would be needed to determine where a corporation is at home. Justice SOTOMAYOR's proposal to import Asahi 's"reasonableness" check into the general jurisdiction determination, on the other hand, would indeed compound the jurisdictional inquiry. The reasonableness factors identified in Asahi include "the burden on the defendant," "the interests of the forum State," "the plaintiff's interest in obtaining relief," "the interstate judicial system's interest in obtaining the most efficient resolution of controversies," "the shared interest of the several States in furthering fundamental substantive social policies," and, in the international context, "the procedural and substantive policies of other nations whose interests are affected by the assertion of jurisdiction." 480 U.S., at 113-115 , 107 S.Ct. 1026 (some internal quotation marks omitted). Imposing such a checklist in cases of general jurisdiction would hardly promote the efficient disposition of an issue that should be resolved expeditiously at the outset of litigation.

2 While our decisions rejecting the exercise of personal jurisdiction have typically done so under the minimum-contacts prong, we have never required that prong to be decided first. See Asahi Metal Industry Co. v. Superior Court of Cal., Solano Cty., 480 U.S. 102 , 121, 107 S.Ct. 1026 , 94 L.Ed.2d 92 (1987) (Stevens, J., concurring in part and concurring in judgment) (rejecting personal jurisdiction under the reasonableness prong and declining to consider the minimum-contacts prong because doing so would not be "necessary"). And although the majority frets that deciding this case on the reasonableness ground would be "a resolution fit for this day and case only," ante, at 762, n. 20, I do not understand our constitutional duty to require otherwise.

4 See DaimlerChrysler, Innovations for our Customers: Annual Report 2004, p. 22, http://www.daimler.com/Projects/c2 c/channel/documents/1364377_2004_DaimlerChrysler_Annual_Report.pdf (as visited on Jan. 8, 2014, and available in Clerk of Court's case file).

5 To be sure, many of Daimler's key management decisions are undoubtedly made by employees outside California. But the same was true in Perkins . See Perkins v. Benguet Consol. Min. Co., 88 Ohio App. 118 , 124, 95 N.E.2d 5 , 8 (1950) ( per curiam ) (describing management decisions made by the company's chief of staff in Manila and a purchasing agent in California); see also n. 8, infra.

7 The majority suggests that I misinterpret language in Perkins that I do not even cite. Ante, at 756, n. 8. The majority is quite correct that it has found a sentence in Perkins that does not address whether most of the Philippine corporation's activities took place outside of Ohio. See ante, at 756, n. 8 (noting that Perkins described the company's "wartime activities" as "necessarily limited," 342 U.S., at 448 , 72 S.Ct. 413 ). That is why I did not mention it. I instead rely on a sentence in Perkins ' opening paragraph: "The [Philippine] corporation has been carrying on in Ohio a continuous and systematic, but limited, part of its general business." Id., at 438 , 72 S.Ct. 413 . That sentence obviously does convey that most of the corporation's activities occurred in "places other than Ohio," ante, at 756, n. 8. This is not surprising given that the company's Ohio contacts involved a single officer working from a home office, while its non-Ohio contacts included significant mining properties and machinery operated throughout the Philippines, Philippine employees (including a chief of staff), a purchasing agent based in California, and board of directors meetings held in Washington, New York, and San Francisco. Perkins, 88 Ohio App., at 123-124 , 95 N.E.2d, at 8 ; see also n. 8, infra.

10 States will of course continue to exercise specific jurisdiction in many cases, but we have never held that to be the outer limit of the States' authority under the Due Process Clause. That is because the two forms of jurisdiction address different concerns. Whereas specific jurisdiction focuses on the relationship between a defendant's challenged conduct and the forum State, general jurisdiction focuses on the defendant's substantial presence in the State irrespective of the location of the challenged conduct.