Background: A Four-Year-Old Employment Dispute Removed to the Business Court

Bestway Oilfield, Inc. filed suit against Jacob R. Cox and ServicePlus, LLC in Harris County's 270th Judicial District Court over four-and-a-half years before the October 2024 removal. The complaint alleged Cox breached his employment agreement with Bestway, created a "secret side business" (ServicePlus), and misappropriated Bestway's "contacts and proprietary information." By Bestway's estimation, "Cox and ServicePlus enjoyed immediate success with the secret side business, which is now grossing well over $10 Million . . . [per] year."

On October 24, 2024, Bestway filed a notice of removal to the Business Court, initially representing that "Defendants do not agree to the removal." Bestway later filed a brief on November 14, 2024, asserting that "[t]he parties in this case have agreed to submit to the Business Court's jurisdiction and the amount in controversy exceeds $10 Million." Bestway invoked Section 25A.004(d)(2)'s provision for agreed jurisdiction "in which the parties to the contract or transaction agreed in the contract or a subsequent agreement that the business court has jurisdiction."

The Jurisdictional Question: Does H.B. 19 Apply to Pre-Effective-Date Cases?

Judge Adrogué sua sponte examined the court's subject-matter jurisdiction, noting the court's "obligation to examine its subject-matter jurisdiction any time it is in question." The central issue was whether Section 8 of H.B. 19—which provides that "[t]he changes in law made by this Act apply to civil actions commenced on or after September 1, 2024"—bars Business Court jurisdiction over cases filed before the court's creation, even when parties subsequently agree to removal.

Bestway argued that the parties' post-filing agreement to Business Court jurisdiction satisfied Section 25A.004(d)(2), and that H.B. 19 expressly authorizes parties to agree to jurisdiction in the Business Court during the pendency of an action. Bestway also requested that if the court found it lacked jurisdiction, it should either certify a permissive interlocutory appeal or stay the remand pending the Fifteenth Court of Appeals' resolution of Synergy Global Outsourcing, LLC v. Hinduja Global Solutions, Inc., 2024 Tex. Bus. 2, which presented the identical jurisdictional question.

The Court's Ruling: Plain Text Forecloses Jurisdiction

Judge Adrogué held that the Business Court lacks jurisdiction over the case, applying principles of statutory construction. The opinion emphasized that courts must "accurately articulate the meaning of the enacted text" and that H.B. 19's plain text is controlling. The court ordered that "this suit be remanded to the district court."

However, recognizing the importance of the jurisdictional question and the pending appellate proceedings in Synergy, the court stayed its remand order: "To the extent that the Court has the authority to do so, the Court STAYS the remand order contained herein, and all proceedings under this cause number, pending the resolution of the traditional appeal and mandamus proceeding arising out of" Synergy Global Outsourcing, LLC v. Hinduja Global Solutions, Inc.

Significance: Awaiting Appellate Guidance on Temporal Scope

The Bestway decision represents the second published Business Court opinion addressing whether H.B. 19's effective date provision bars jurisdiction over pre-September 1, 2024 cases. Like Synergy before it, the court concluded that the statute's plain language—"civil actions commenced on or after September 1, 2024"—precludes jurisdiction over cases filed before the Business Court's creation, regardless of party consent. The stayed remand ensures that the Fifteenth Court of Appeals will have the opportunity to provide definitive guidance on this threshold jurisdictional question affecting numerous potential removals of pending cases.