## Facts

- Ashland Inc. obtained a Japanese patent covering a “cold-box” method for manufacturing casting-industry “riser sleeves.”
- Ashland retained Computer Packages, Inc. (CPI) to perform patent-maintenance services in Japan, including paying annual maintenance fees.
- Ashland assigned the Japanese patent to ASK Chemicals, LP (ASK) in 2010, and CPI continued providing maintenance services.
- CPI failed to pay required Japanese maintenance fees, causing the patent to lapse under Japanese law.
- CPI admitted it breached its contractual obligation by failing to make the required payment and that the patent lapsed as a result.
- ASK sued for breach of contract (and later implied-in-fact contract), seeking compensatory and expectancy damages, primarily lost profits from exploiting the patent in Japan.
- At the time of the lapse, ASK had no sales of the related technology in Japan and no established Japanese customer base or earnings history.

## Issues

1. Whether, under Ohio contract law, ASK produced evidence sufficient to prove lost-profit damages with reasonable certainty, rather than speculation, from CPI’s admitted breach.
2. Whether ASK’s damages evidence created a genuine dispute of material fact sufficient to defeat summary judgment.

## Decision

- The Sixth Circuit affirmed the district court’s grant of summary judgment for CPI.
- The court treated CPI’s breach and the patent’s lapse as undisputed, and focused on whether ASK proved recoverable damages.
- The court held ASK failed to demonstrate lost profits with reasonable certainty because its projections for the Japanese market lacked an objective, reliable evidentiary basis.
- With damages proof legally insufficient, no triable issue remained for a jury.

## Legal Principles

- Under Ohio contract law, lost-profit damages must be proven with reasonable certainty; speculative damages are not recoverable.
- When a plaintiff seeks lost profits for a new or untested market, courts require stronger proof (e.g., reliable market-specific data, comparable performance evidence, or other objective support) than unsupported projections.
- An admission of breach does not establish entitlement to substantial damages; the plaintiff must still prove the amount of damages with legally sufficient evidence.
- Summary judgment is proper when the nonmovant’s damages theory depends on assumptions and projections that do not meet the reasonable-certainty standard.

## Conclusion

The Sixth Circuit affirmed summary judgment because, although CPI admitted it caused the Japanese patent to lapse, ASK’s claimed lost profits from a market in which it had no sales history were too speculative to satisfy Ohio’s reasonable-certainty requirement for contract damages.


ASK Chems., LP v. Comput. Packages, Inc., 593 F. App’x 506 (6th Cir. 2014)