Robert focuses on providing clients with effective and efficient representation across a broad range of intellectual property matters with particular emphasis on patent licensing, litigation and prosecution. He regularly counsels his clients regarding strategic intellectual property planning, licensing and technology transactions, new product development, risk assessment, and infringement by competitors. Robert makes it a point to understand his clients’ business and competitive pressures, and his combination of industry and legal experience allows him to consistently provide balanced and useful advice.
Experience:
• Counseling clients on a wide variety of intellectual property matters, including patent
development and portfolio management, joint research agreements and intellectual property
licensing, and mergers and acquisitions.
• Directing both offensive and defensive patent litigation.
• Researching and preparing opinions relating to freedom to practice, patentability, invalidity,
infringement, and other legal questions.
• Drafting and prosecuting patent applications in a broad range of technologies both domestically
and internationally.
• Conducting reexamination and inter partes review proceedings, both offensively and defensively.
• Extensive experience in a broad range of industries, including medical devices, consumer
electronics, telecommunication, absorbent articles, power tools, injection molding, automotive
polymers and robotics.
Robert began his legal career as a patent agent for Laubscher & Laubscher and returned to the firm after working in the intellectual property group at the large multinational general practice firms of Cooley LLP and Goodwin Procter LLP.
Admissions:
• Commonwealth of Virginia
• District of Columbia
• State of Utah
• U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit
• U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia
• U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas
• U.S. Patent & Trademark Office - Registered Patent Attorney
Education:
• George Mason University School of Law
– Juris Doctor, summa cum laude
– Giles Sutherland Rich Award for excellence in the study of intellectual property law
– Finalist, Oxford International Intellectual Property Moot Court
– Editor, George Mason Law Review
• Utah State University
– Bachelor of Science in Mechanical Engineering
– Minor in Portuguese
Before entering law school, Robert worked as an engineer and project manager in the medical device and automotive industries where he was a Six Sigma Green Belt and worked with ISO 9000 certification, kaizen and lean manufacturing. He also lived for nearly two years in Brazil and is proficient in Portuguese.