Enforcing Across Borders: Devas v. Antrix and the Future of Foreign Arbitral Awards

An arbitral award is supposed to bring a dispute to an end. But in international arbitration, winning the award is often only half the battle. The harder question can be: where can the winning party actually enforce it?

The Ninth Circuit’s August 12, 2026 decision in Devas Multimedia Private Ltd. v. Antrix Corp. brings this question into sharp focus. The court rejected Antrix’s argument that the United States was an unsuitable forum for enforcement and held that a U.S. court could exercise jurisdiction over Antrix even without the traditional requirement of proving a connection between Antrix and the United States. It also held that forum non conveniens—the idea that a court may decline a case because another country is a substantially better place to hear it—does not provide a defence to enforcement of a foreign arbitral award under the New York Convention.

For Indian readers, however, the most interesting part of Devas v. Antrix is not simply that an American court has made enforcement easier. The real question is whether the decision exposes a deeper tension in international arbitration: should an enforcement court focus primarily on convenience, or on ensuring that an arbitral award remains capable of being enforced somewhere in the world?

The dispute in simple terms

The underlying dispute arose from an agreement between Antrix Corporation, the commercial arm of India’s space agency, and Devas Multimedia concerning satellite and spectrum technology. Antrix terminated the agreement in 2011. Devas commenced ICC arbitration seated in Delhi, and the tribunal eventually awarded Devas $562.5 million plus interest in 2015. The amount claimed in the U.S. enforcement proceedings subsequently grew to approximately $1.3 billion with interest.

Devas then approached a U.S. federal court seeking enforcement. The litigation became complicated because Antrix is a state-owned Indian corporation and because the award was simultaneously being challenged in India.

The U.S. Supreme Court intervened in 2025. In CC/Devas (Mauritius) Ltd. v. Antrix Corp., 605 U.S. 223 (2025), it unanimously held that the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act does not impose an additional “minimum contacts” requirement beyond the requirements contained in the statutory exceptions to sovereign immunity.

That sent the case back to the Ninth Circuit.

The question was therefore no longer simply whether U.S. law permitted the case. The Ninth Circuit had to decide whether exercising jurisdiction was constitutionally reasonable and whether the case should nevertheless be dismissed because India was a more appropriate forum.

It answered both questions in favour of keeping the U.S. enforcement proceedings alive.

_{Why Fuld v. PLO matters}

One of the most important aspects of the judgment is its reliance on the U.S. Supreme Court's 2025 decision in Fuld v. Palestine Liberation Organization, 606 U.S. 1 (2025).

In simple terms, Fuld moved away from the idea that a court must always begin by asking whether the defendant has sufficient connections with the territory. Instead, for the particular Fifth Amendment question involved, the court can examine whether exercising jurisdiction is reasonable.

The Ninth Circuit therefore considered three broad questions:

1. Does the United States have a legitimate interest in hearing the matter?
2. Would defending the case place an unreasonable burden on Antrix?
3. Does Devas have a genuine interest in obtaining relief from a U.S. court?

The court answered all three in the affirmative.

The United States had an interest in complying with its obligations under the New York Convention. Antrix, as a sophisticated state-owned corporation with substantial resources, would not face an unreasonable burden. Most importantly, Devas had a practical reason for proceeding in the United States: assets located in the United States could be reached there in a manner that courts outside the United States could not accomplish.

This is a significant conceptual shift.

The question becomes less “Why is this dispute connected to America?” and more “Is there a good reason for America to refuse enforcement when enforcement is actually possible here?”

That distinction could become increasingly important as international businesses hold assets across several jurisdictions.

The more important ruling: forum non conveniens

The second holding may have even greater significance for international arbitration.

Forum non conveniens essentially allows a court to say: I may technically hear this dispute, but another country is a substantially more appropriate place to do so.

Antrix argued that India was the natural forum. The arbitration had been seated in Delhi, the underlying agreement involved Indian parties, and important proceedings concerning the award had already taken place in India.

The Ninth Circuit nevertheless refused to dismiss the U.S. enforcement proceedings.

Its reasoning is persuasive from the perspective of enforcement. An enforcement proceeding is not the same thing as a fresh trial on the original commercial dispute. The court is not being asked to recreate the arbitration. It is being asked to determine whether an existing award should be recognised and enforced.

The court also stressed a practical point: if the relevant assets are in the United States, a U.S. court may be the only court capable of giving the successful party meaningful relief against those assets. In such circumstances, telling the award-holder to go somewhere else may effectively mean telling it that it has no remedy at all.

This is where the decision becomes important beyond Devas.

But America is not unanimous

The Ninth Circuit's approach is not the settled rule throughout the United States.

In Monegasque de Reassurances S.A.M. v. Nak Naftogaz of Ukraine, 311 F.3d 488 (2d Cir. 2002), the Second Circuit held that forum non conveniens could apply to a proceeding seeking enforcement of a foreign arbitral award. The court treated the doctrine as a procedural rule which could coexist with the New York Convention's enforcement framework.

The D.C. Circuit subsequently took the opposite position in NextEra Energy Global Holdings B.V. v. Kingdom of Spain, 112 F.4th 1088 (D.C. Cir. 2024), holding that forum non conveniens does not apply to actions seeking enforcement of foreign arbitral awards.

The Ninth Circuit has now joined the D.C. Circuit.

Therefore, there is a genuine circuit split:

This matters because a circuit court decision is not equivalent to a decision of the U.S. Supreme Court. The Ninth Circuit's ruling binds federal courts within its circuit, but it does not automatically become the law throughout the United States. The Supreme Court may eventually have to resolve the disagreement.

Interestingly, the Supreme Court recently declined to review NextEra, leaving the disagreement unresolved.

What does Indian law tell us?

Indian law provides an interesting comparison because Indian courts do recognise forum non conveniens.

The Indian Supreme Court's decision in M/s Arif Azim Co. Ltd. v. M/s Micromax Informatics FZE, 2024 INSC 850, provides a particularly useful discussion. The Court explained that the doctrine permits a court having jurisdiction to decline to exercise it where another forum is more appropriate. An important requirement is that the alternative forum must be capable of providing a fair and adequate remedy. Courts may consider both private and public interests in making that assessment.

This sounds quite different from the Ninth Circuit's approach in Devas.

But there is an important distinction.

India's doctrine generally operates in determining the appropriate forum for deciding a dispute. Devas concerns the enforcement of an already-existing arbitral award.

That distinction should not be overlooked.

The Indian Supreme Court has repeatedly emphasised that an enforcement court should not treat enforcement proceedings as an opportunity to rehear the dispute. In Shri Lal Mahal Ltd. v. Progetto Grano SpA, (2014) 2 SCC 433, following Renusagar Power Co. Ltd. v. General Electric Co., 1994 Supp (1) SCC 644, the Court adopted a narrow approach to refusal of enforcement of foreign awards. The focus is on limited statutory grounds rather than reconsidering the merits of the award.

The Supreme Court reiterated this philosophy in later decisions, including Vijay Karia v. Prysmian Cavi E Sistemi SRL, (2020) 11 SCC 1: interference at the enforcement stage is deliberately limited.

The same internationalist approach appears in the Supreme Court's 2024 arbitration jurisprudence. In Avitel Post Studioz Ltd. v. HSBC PI Holdings (Mauritius) Ltd., the Court stressed that international arbitration should ordinarily be approached through internationally accepted standards rather than importing domestic standards into the enforcement process.

The difficult question: what happens when the seat court has already set aside the award?

This is where Devas becomes considerably more complicated.

The Indian proceedings did not merely concern procedural convenience. The award was challenged in India, and the Delhi High Court set it aside on the basis that it had been procured by fraud. That decision was subsequently upheld by the Supreme Court of India. The Ninth Circuit's latest decision therefore does not mean that Devas has finally collected $1.3 billion. The Ninth Circuit remanded the matter for further proceedings concerning the effect of the Indian proceedings and the setting aside of the award.

This distinction is crucial.

There are really two different questions:

First: Can an American court hear the enforcement application?

The Ninth Circuit has essentially said yes.

Second: Should the American court ultimately enforce an award that has been set aside by the courts at the seat?

That question remains much more difficult.

Indian arbitration law itself gives enormous importance to the court of the seat. The Supreme Court has repeatedly treated the seat court as having supervisory authority over the arbitration. In Arif Azim, for example, the Court reiterated that where the seat is outside India, Part I of the Arbitration and Conciliation Act, 1996 does not ordinarily govern the arbitration.

This reflects a broader principle of international arbitration: the court at the seat normally has the primary responsibility for supervising and setting aside the award, while courts elsewhere generally act as enforcement courts.

What Devas ultimately teaches India

For Indian businesses entering international contracts, the lesson is not that an arbitral award automatically becomes enforceable wherever the winner finds assets.

The lesson is subtler.

The New York Convention creates an international enforcement system precisely because an award may need to travel across borders. Article III requires Convention states to recognise awards and enforce them according to their procedural law, while Article V identifies limited grounds on which enforcement may be refused.

Devas pushes this philosophy further: an enforcement court should be cautious before allowing procedural objections about convenience to become a substitute for the limited grounds for resisting an award.

That approach is attractive because international arbitration loses much of its value if an award-holder can win arbitration but then spend another decade searching for a court willing to enforce it.

Yet there is an equally important caution.

If enforcement courts become completely indifferent to the decision of the court at the seat, international arbitration could develop a different problem: the same award could be declared invalid in one jurisdiction and enforced in another. The result would be uncertainty rather than finality.

Indeed, the Indian Supreme Court has recently recognised this very tension while discussing whether decisions of the seat court should have a preclusive effect in later enforcement proceedings. The Court noted the danger of an award being enforced in one jurisdiction while being set aside in another.

Conclusion

The real significance of Devas v. Antrix therefore, lies beyond the $1.3 billion figure.

It forces courts to confront a fundamental question of international arbitration: when should the desire to respect territorial boundaries give way to the need to make an arbitral award effective?

The Ninth Circuit has chosen a strongly enforcement-oriented answer. It has said that the absence of traditional connections with the United States does not necessarily prevent jurisdiction, and that forum non conveniens cannot simply be used to send an award-holder elsewhere when the United States is the place where meaningful enforcement can occur.

For India, the comparison is especially instructive. Indian courts recognise forum non conveniens, but Indian arbitration law simultaneously adopts a restrained approach to reviewing foreign awards. The emerging international picture is therefore not one of eliminating judicial discretion, but of placing that discretion within clearer boundaries.

Ultimately, an arbitral award is valuable only if it can produce a real-world result.

The future of international arbitration may therefore depend on finding the right balance between two competing ideas: respect for the court of the seat and effectiveness of enforcement elsewhere. Devas v. Antrix does not resolve that tension. It brings it into the open—and, with a growing U.S. circuit split, may eventually force the U.S. Supreme Court to decide where that balance should lie.