I'm afraid I'm not sure what your question means. "exoneration" could be taken to mean that the company was exonerated from having to pay royalties. To me, "mettre hors cause" implies making a statement that someone is not liable or responsible or guilty of committing an act attributed to them. Your question does not make it clear - to me - what exactly anyone is to be "mis hors cause" for. I don't see the connection with the author seeking annulment of the clause (other than by reading a lot between your lines).

Based on my interpretation of the information given, "exculpation" seems like a likely candidate, but could only be confirmed with more info.

1. Subject Field(s)
– Phraseology
– Decisions (Litigation)

Subject Field(s)
– Phraséologie
– Jugements (Droit judiciaire)

relieved from the contestation Source hors de cause Source CORRECT
OBS – Se dit d'un parti qui [...] est écarté de l'instance Source

From the Grand dictionnaire terminologique

Other possibility: "Declare an appeal inadmissible" since they are adressing an appeal court.
However, I agree with Bourth, that it´s not really clear "what exactly anyone is to be "mis hors cause" for".


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Note added at 1 hr (2006-01-22 01:13:22 GMT)
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Sorry, I mean "dismiss the case".

I am fairly sure that 'mise hors de cause' is not being used in the sense of 'exoneration' in this instance.

I believe that it means that the party asking to be 'mise hors de cause' is actually asking the court to say that they have 'no case to answer' in these proceedings.

This could be, for example, because the claimant has inadvertently issued a writ to 'ABC Holdings Ltd', when the company it actually has a cause of action against is 'ABC Ltd', a related company. 'ABC Holdings Ltd' would then have a valid motive for asking to be 'mise hors de cause'. Or, for example, the claimant has issued a writ against an individual, when in fact the individual was acting as a representative of a company when the alleged damage occurred, and it should therefore be the company that is sued.

Another example would be if the claimant was bringing an action on the basis of a contract, and the defendant was not a party to that contract - they could then legitimately ask to be 'mise hors de cause'.

In other words, the party making the motion is saying 'There are no grounds for me to be in court at all.' They are not saying 'I didn't do what I'm accused of' or 'I wasn't responsible for the loss'.

I don't know how this relates to your context, but I'm fairly sure it is what is meant by this phrase. As for a translation, I have not had time to come up with the appropriate phrase, but something along the lines of 'exclusion/excluded from the proceedings' might work. I might be able to come up with more information a bit later.