You are probably thinking of patents. For a long time the Eastern District of Texas (EDTX) was by far the most popular choice for patent lawsuits by far, especially against big tech companies.

Then there was a Supreme Court decision (TC Heartland LLC v. Kraft Foods Group Brands LLC, 581 U.S. 258 (2017)) [1]. It made it so corporations can only be sued for patent infringement in the state where they are incorporated or a district where they have both infringed and have a regular and established place of business.

EDTX is largely a rural district with no really major cities. Most big tech companies have no physical offices there.

Many of those cases moved to the Western District of Texas (WDTX). WDTX includes Austin, and a whole lot of big tech has offices there.

There was one judge in Waco whose court was particularly attractive to patent lawsuits, due to having plaintiff-friendly procedures and a rapid trial schedule. 100% of patent cases filed in Waco went to him. In a few years his court was handling 20% of all patents cases in the entire country.

The Supreme Court and Congress did not like so many patent cases being handled by a single judge, and the WDTX Chief Judge making it so patent cases filed in WDTX are random distributed among its 13 judges.

Cases against big tech companies mostly moved to Delaware (where many big tech companies are incorporated) or Northern California.

EDTX regained the number one spot for patent cases after that, although not from big tech cases. Delaware and Northern California remain the big places for those.

EDTX is #1 because even though it is rural and has almost no big tech presence, it still has major retailers, grocery chains, distribution centers, and communication hubs. For patent suits not against big tech it still works fine.

Also, Heartland did not apply to international defendants. They can still be sued in any district in the US.

The biggest reason EDTX is a popular choice if you can pick it is not plaintiffs do particularly well there. It depends on when you look because it has varied quite a bit, but there are often other districts where plaintiffs win more.

The big reasons are:

• Patent litigation is complex, both for the court and the attorneys. Regardless of which side of the case is on you want a court with experience. If the court is inexperienced the case can drag on which is expensive, burning up lots of billable hours of the expensive patent litigation firm you are using. EDTX has many patent experienced judges, and has developed rules and procedures to move cases along.

• In addition to cases moving along efficiently once they get going, the get going faster in EDTX.

Patent suits are civil cases. They take a back seat to criminal cases. EDTX simply does not have much federal crime (or state crime that ends up in federal district courts).

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TC_Heartland_LLC_v._Kraft_Food...