BCI Media Group Pty Ltd v CoreLogic Australia Pty Ltd (Strikeout)

This decision sits inside a larger Federal Court dispute between BCI Media Group and companies in the CoreLogic group. The broader case concerns alleged use of information associated with BCI’s LeadManager product and whether that information was used to improve the respondents’ Cordell Connect product. But this judgment is not the trial result. It is a procedural ruling on a late strikeout application.

The respondents brought the application in November 2025, with the final hearing already listed to begin on 8 April 2026 for 18 days. The court had already dealt with several earlier interlocutory disputes in the same proceeding, including decisions about amendment, strikeout, review of a registrar’s decision and an application to vacate the hearing. The reasons make clear that this was a long-running and heavily managed commercial case.

The respondents targeted two paragraphs in BCI’s Further Amended Statement of Claim. The first was paragraph 43, which alleged by inference that RP Data used information copied from LeadManager and comparative documents to improve Cordell Connect by identifying gaps and filling them. The second was paragraph 82E, which alleged that CoreLogic, Inc, as ultimate parent company, financially benefited from the alleged infringements through increased revenue and reduced operational costs in subsidiaries.

So the commercial story here is not yet about who won the copyright fight. It is about whether BCI had pleaded enough to let those allegations go to trial, and whether the respondents had left it too late to complain.

Paragraph 43 was the main focus. BCI pleaded that it should be inferred that RP Data used information copied from LeadManager and comparative documents to improve Cordell Connect in two ways: first, by identifying gaps in Cordell Connect, and second, by using copied information to fill those gaps. The pleading referred to emails between 29 RP Data employees, two Cordell employees and two directors. The particulars also referred to discovered documents and a confidential list of projects.

The respondents argued that this was still too vague. They said BCI needed to identify the specific gaps alleged and the specific information used to fill those gaps. One example raised in submissions was a Reservoir project. The respondents said the pleading did not reveal what data point was supposedly missing or filled, such as the builder’s name or the architect’s contact details. They also objected that the listed projects were said to be a representative sample and were described as those presently known to BCI. In their view, that suggested BCI had not fully particularised its case and might later try to expand it.

The respondents also said that if paragraph 43 were struck out, a number of other paragraphs that depended on it should also fall away. They relied in part on authority dealing with the need to identify the actual subject matter of alleged copyright breaches rather than proceed by a small sample where that would be inadequate.

Paragraph 82E raised a different issue. BCI alleged that CoreLogic, Inc’s authorisation of the alleged infringements enlarged its profits because it financially benefited from increased revenue and reduced operational costs in RP Data and Cordell as ultimate parent company. The respondents said that allegation was unsustainable. They argued that no facts were pleaded showing how subsidiary activities increased the parent company’s profits, and that BCI’s accounting expert had dealt with sale price and capital value in connection with a takeover transaction, while the pleading itself referred to enlargement of profit. They also argued that it was flawed to say a parent company simply makes profit from the profits of subsidiaries in that way.

BCI’s answer had two main parts. First, it said the application was too late. The court had made orders on 7 July 2025 requiring any application in relation to pleadings or particulars to be filed by 18 July 2025. No such application was filed in relation to these paragraphs. BCI pointed out that materially similar versions of paragraphs 43 and 82E had been in earlier statements of claim, that the respondents had already pleaded to them, and that the respondents had filed evidence responding to them. The reasons refer to affidavits from respondent witnesses that addressed paragraph 43 specifically.

Second, BCI said paragraph 43 was a proper inferential pleading. It argued that the pleading and particulars identified the foundational facts from which the inference was to be drawn, including emails, discovered documents and listed projects. BCI also said that the respondents’ own records did not necessarily record the exact information the respondents now demanded by way of particulars. In that setting, BCI said it should be allowed to prove its case by inference rather than by matching every individual project and every individual data change.

The reasons record BCI’s submission that it would not be practical or possible to perform a matching exercise on every project, especially given the scale of the alleged extraction and use of LeadManager information. The judgment also notes that both parties had agreed in earlier proceedings that some regime should be formulated so the court would not need to determine each and every instance of information obtained from LeadManager.

On paragraph 82E, BCI again relied on timing and said the respondents had already had their chance to challenge the pleading. It also argued that the issue of whether CoreLogic, Inc’s value or profits had been enlarged by the activities of subsidiaries was a triable issue, and that its expert evidence had engaged with that question.

The legal issue was procedural. The court had to decide whether to strike out parts of the pleading under the Federal Court Rules, or require further and better particulars, because the allegations were said to be evasive, ambiguous, prejudicial, embarrassing, lacking a reasonable basis, or otherwise an abuse of process. The court also had to consider the effect of case management orders and the advanced stage of the proceeding.

The reasons set out the usual strikeout principles. The court noted that the power to strike out should normally be exercised only in plain and obvious cases, where no reasonable amendment could cure the defect, and that the power is discretionary and used sparingly. That matters because strikeout is not meant to become a routine tactical step whenever a party would prefer more detail.

The court also referred to section 37M of the Federal Court of Australia Act 1976 (Cth), which requires matters to be resolved justly and as quickly, inexpensively and efficiently as possible. In a large and complex case, the judge said there may be many pre-trial skirmishes, but at some point the parties must focus on preparing for the hearing. The reasons emphasise that balancing justice, fairness, efficiency and the court’s own business is part of modern case management.

Importantly, this means the decision is not authority on whether the underlying copyright allegations are true. It is authority on pleading sufficiency, inferential allegations, delay in bringing interlocutory applications, and the court’s willingness to enforce procedural discipline in a mature proceeding.

The court dismissed the interlocutory application with costs. The orders were made on 12 December 2025 and the reasons were published on 17 December 2025.

On the available reasons, timing was a major factor. The judge concluded that the respondents should have brought the application in response to the 7 July 2025 orders. The reasons note that materially similar versions of paragraphs 43 and 82E had been in earlier pleadings, including a statement of claim filed in November 2023 from which later versions flowed. The court also noted that paragraph 43 had already been the subject of attention before July 2025, that the parties had corresponded about particulars, and that when the respondents later sought further and better particulars of other paragraphs in September 2025, they did not include paragraph 43.

The court considered it significant that the respondents had been able to plead to paragraphs 43 and 82E and had filed evidence specifically responding to them, including expert accounting evidence. In that context, the late complaint was difficult to sustain. The reasons also state that the hearing was only four months away and that the parties should be getting on with hearing preparation rather than taking points that should have been taken months earlier.

The catchwords and the available text also show that the court accepted the importance of inferential pleading where the pleading includes foundational facts and the inference to be drawn. In relation to paragraph 43, the extract indicates that this was properly pleaded as an inferential case. That is a key point. The court was not saying BCI had proved the allegation. It was saying the allegation was pleaded well enough to remain in the case.

Because the available reasons are truncated, the full detail of the court’s treatment of paragraph 82E should be read with caution. What can be said confidently is that the strikeout application as a whole failed and costs were awarded against the respondents.

There are several practical messages for businesses from this decision.

First, if you are defending a claim and think the pleading is too vague, act early. Do not assume you can leave the point until close to trial. If the court has set a timetable for pleading or particulars applications, treat that timetable as real. Delay can be fatal, especially if the allegation has existed in substance for a long time and you have already pleaded to it or filed evidence about it.

Second, if your business is bringing a claim involving data use, software, databases or internal product updates, direct proof of every individual act may not always be available or practical. This case shows that a court may permit an inferential pleading where the claimant identifies the foundational facts, such as emails, discovered documents, project lists and system records, and clearly states the inference it asks the court to draw. That does not guarantee success at trial, but it may be enough to survive a strikeout challenge.

Third, record-keeping matters. The reasons refer to emails, discovered documents, project lists and database-related material. In many commercial technology disputes, the real fight is over what internal records show about how a product was improved, what official source was consulted, and whether changes were independently developed or derived from another source. Businesses should maintain clear audit trails around data ingestion, benchmarking, product updates and source permissions.

Fourth, group structures do not eliminate risk. The challenged pleading included an allegation that the ultimate parent company financially benefited from the alleged infringements of subsidiaries. Even though the full reasoning on that point is not fully available here, the case is a reminder that where a parent company is alleged to have authorised conduct or benefited from it, pleading and remedy issues can extend beyond the operating subsidiary.

Finally, this decision is a reminder that litigation strategy is not separate from the merits. Procedural choices, including when to challenge a pleading and how consistently you respond to it, can shape what arguments remain open later in the case.

The judgment records that the interlocutory application was filed on 21 November 2025, heard on 8 December 2025, dismissed with costs on 12 December 2025, and reasons were published on 17 December 2025. The final hearing was listed to commence on 8 April 2026 for 18 days.

This page should be read as a case note on a procedural ruling only. It does not state the final outcome of the broader dispute between the parties.

This page is based on the Federal Court judgment in BCI Media Group Pty Ltd v CoreLogic Australia Pty Ltd (Strikeout) [2025] FCA 1600. The available reasons clearly support the points made here about strikeout principles, inferential pleading, delay, case management and the dismissal of the application with costs.

The available text is truncated. That means some aspects, especially the detailed reasoning on paragraph 82E and the parent-company profit issue, are not fully visible here. For that reason, this page avoids making broader claims about that aspect of the case than the available reasons support.