Washington in the West Speakers 2023

Hector Agdeppa, Partner, Sheppard Mullin

Hector Agdeppa is a partner in the Intellectual Property Practice Group in the firm’s San Diego (Del Mar) office. Hector specializes in patent application drafting and prosecution in the electrical, mechanical and computer software arts, as well as in the medical device field, and he is well-versed in the management and monetization of patent portfolios. He is also experienced in inter partes review proceedings, tech transfer and licensing, IP due diligence and opinion/freedom to operate assessments, and he provides patent litigation support for a variety of clients, large and small, covering a broad range of industries.

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Michelle Armond, Founding Partner, Armond Wilson LLP

Michelle Armond is a founding partner of the IP litigation boutique Armond Wilson LLP.  An award-winning litigation attorney focusing on intellectual property disputes, litigation, IPRs, and appeals, Michelle focuses on patent, trademark, and trade secret matters.  She has handled disputes covering a wide array of industries and technologies including electronics, telecommunications, software, gaming, mechanical, electro-mechanical, energy, automotive, medical devices, consumer, and household goods.

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Bryan Blumenkopf, Associate, Morrison & Foerster

As a seasoned engineer from some of California’s leading game development and space/defense companies, Bryan Blumenkopf applies his experience developing cutting-edge electronics and software systems to advising innovative clients on patent prosecution, patent litigation, and intellectual property strategy.  He has represented technology companies in mission-critical matters relating to artificial intelligence, mobile devices, audio systems, semiconductor devices, wireless communications, computer software, optics, virtual reality, and interactive media — fields in which he often has first-hand experience as a practitioner himself.

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Scott Boalick, Chief Judge for the Patent Trial and Appeal Board, USPTO

Amy Breyer, Breyer Andrew LLP

Amy is a software and intellectual property attorney with a passion for technology and media.
She handles a wide range of IP, technology and cloud-related agreements, including nondisclosure, proprietary information and inventions, beta-testing, asset purchase, software-asa-service (SaaS), licensing, white labeling, support level, extended support, consent, coexistence, and co-branding agreements. Her practice also includes trademark preparation,enforcement and defense, as well as general brand strategy and advisory. Amy also has a decade of experience in all stages of trial and appellate litigation – both state and federal, plaintiff and defense – handling a wide range of contract, tort, statutory and constitutional claims.

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Kyrie Cameron, Associate, Patterson + Sheridan LLP.

Kyrie Cameron joined the firm in 2015 and has since developed a diverse range of technical expertise, with special emphasis on energy, oil and gas, and electronics and semiconductor technologies. Inspired by a love for science and strong family ties to the legal industry, Kyrie obtained her undergraduate degree in biology from Baylor University and immediately began carving out a reputation for herself as a valued contributor at South Texas College of Law.

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Arka Chatterjee, Senior IP Counsel, Natera

As an in-house counsel at a nimble and expanding life-sciences company, Arka advises on litigation and risk management while helping to develop intellectual property strategies that expand the company’s innovation and business options. His work covers a wide gamut of IP activities including patent prosecution and litigation, trademark registration and enforcement, deal support, and day-to-day advising of both R&D and executive leadership.

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Jennifer Chiang, IP Counsel, Stripe

Jennifer Chiang is IP Counsel at Stripe, where she manages the company’s patent strategy, patent portfolio development, and open source licensing. Prior to joining Stripe, Jennifer worked at Slack Technologies (acquired by Salesforce) as the company’s first patent attorney where she developed Slack’s patent portfolio and IP strategy. Prior to going in-house, Jennifer worked in private practice advising clients on patent strategy and portfolio development, standards, licensing, acquisitions, and litigation matters. Jennifer has a background in computer engineering and previously worked as a software developer at Microsoft prior to practicing law.

Jay Choi, Director, IP, Uber Technologies, Inc.

Jay Choi is a director of intellectual property at Uber Technologies, Inc. His responsibilities include patent portfolio development, patent acquisition and licensing strategy, and patent dispute resolution. He also advises the company on M&A, IP-related transactions, and open source licensing. Prior to joining Uber, Mr. Choi worked in private practice specializing in portfolio development and patent strategy, advising various software and tech companies. Mr. Choi joined Uber in 2014 as Uber’s first IP attorney and over the years, has helped build Uber’s IP legal practice.

Chris DiLeo, Assistant General Counsel – IP, Becton Dickinson

Technology transactions and IP attorney experienced in software and networked systems. As a technically savvy technical lead with excellent communication skills I can leverage my strengths, interests, and experiences working with both people and technology along with law degree to practice intellectual property and technology law. My practice also includes advising clients on data privacy, GDPR, big data, and terms of service.

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Alesha M. Dominique
Stroock & Stroock & Lavan LLP

Alesha Dominique represents clients in intellectual property litigation, with an emphasis on patent, trademark, false advertising, and unfair competition matters.  Alesha’s experience includes representing clients before federal district courts, the U.S. International Trade Commission, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, and the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board. She also counsels clients on trademark clearance, prosecution, and enforcement matters. Alesha’s experience cuts across multiple industries, including the entertainment, music, fashion, beauty, food and beverage, software and e-commerce industries.

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Colette Durst, Vice President and Chief Trademark Counsel, 3M

Colette manages a global team of trademark professionals and leads the anti-counterfeiting program for 3M respirators and other 3M products. Prior to joining 3M in 2018, Colette was Legal Director at Johnson Controls and managed all trademark-related activities globally for JCI.  Before the Tyco merger with JCI in 2016, Colette led the trademark function at Tyco and prior to that she was Assistant General Counsel at Walmart Stores. Colette started her career as a trademark paralegal. After graduation from law school Colette became an associate at Pattishall.

Brittany Estell, Director and Senior Counsel of Trademarks, Western Digital Corporation

Brittany Estell is Director and Senior Counsel of Trademarks at Western Digital Corporation. Her role includes management of the company’s global trademark portfolio, supporting marketing and branding efforts across the organization, and maintaining and developing usage guidelines to protect the company’s IP assets.

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Sharmini Green, Associate General Counsel, Intel Corporation

Sharmini has 22 years experience as a patent attorney specializing in computer software, the past 17.5 years as an in-house attorney with Intel. She holds a bachelor’s degree in Mechanical Engineering from MIT and received her J.D. from Santa Clara University. Sharmini is currently one of the Deputy Directors of Patents in the Intel Patent Group. In this role, she defines and executes patent filing strategies for Intel’s new and cutting edge technologies such as Internet of Things, autonomous driving, drones, augmented reality and artificial intelligence.

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Christopher Jackson, Senior Counsel, IP, Warner Bros. Entertainment

Chris Jackson is senior intellectual property counsel at Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc. Previously, Chris worked for an international law firm, where he gained experience across a number of intellectual property matters.

Chris earned his B.S. in Electrical Engineering from the University of Utah. After working briefly as an engineer, Chris earned his J.D. and Certificate in Intellectual Property Law from the John Marshall Law School in Chicago.

Diane Gabl Kratz, Senior IP Counsel, Manager, Dolby Laboratories

Diane is an IAM Strategy 300 World’s Leading IP Strategist and 2021 World IP Forum “Powerful Woman in IP”.  A USPTO-registered patent attorney, she leads a global team of 16, developing and executing U.S. and international patent filing strategy and heading Dolby’s worldwide trademark portfolio.

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Lauren Keller Katzenellenbogen, Partner, Knobbe Martens

Lauren Katzenellenbogen litigates all types of intellectual property disputes, including claims pertaining to patents, trademarks, unfair competition, trade secrets and copyrights. For nearly two decades, she has represented clients in litigation involving an array of industries, including computer software, medical and mechanical devices, consumer products, fashion, energy drinks and entertainment.

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Jordan Keglovits, Legal Manager, Taylor Guitars

Ms. Keglovits is the Legal Manager at Taylor Guitars, the market leading brand in the global acoustic guitar industry headquartered in San Diego, California.

Jordan manages company legal functions, including management of the company’s IP portfolio with the mission of protecting proprietary innovations and brand rights, and defending against infringements and counterfeits. She additionally manages corporate governance, contracts, and compliance functions.

She has a Bachelor’s in Political Science from the University of Kansas, and a Juris Doctorate from Thomas Jefferson School of Law.

Alexander Korenberg, Kilburn & Strode

Alexander Korenberg is a partner in our Tech team and leads the firm’s AI practice. With over 20 years in the profession, Alexander is a Tech maestro with a solid grip on the legal aspects of patent prosecution and extremely technically savvy, who builds futureproofed patent strategies in cutting-edge areas such as AI (in the words of industry publications). His passion for everything AI stems from his time gaining a PhD at the Gatsby Computational Neuroscience Unit, then led by Geoff Hinton. His work there included early studies into the use of unsupervised learning for inference and artificial neural network models of human motor control.

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Kristin Lamb, Head of IP, Oura

Intellectual Property Law practitioner with experience in patent, trademark, and copyright preparation and prosecution, and IP licensing and litigation across various technological fields, with an emphasis on consumer products, automation, medical device, health and fitness monitoring, software, energy, and natural resource technologies.

Joyce Liou, Partner, Morrison & Foerster

Joyce Liou co-chairs the Trademark Group and is a partner in the firm’s Intellectual Property Group. She engages in a broad intellectual property practice, with an emphasis on both IP counseling and litigation for a diverse roster of clients. Joyce has litigated numerous district court disputes involving trademark, copyright, false advertising, right of publicity, and unfair competition claims, and has secured preliminary injunctions, summary judgment rulings, and trial verdicts for her clients.

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Paul Liu, Global Head of IP, TuSimple

Paul Liu is the Global Head of Intellectual Property at TuSimple, a global self-driving truck (e.g., autonomous vehicle) company based out of San Diego. At TuSimple, he oversees a global team of practitioners to align the company’s intellectual property with the business to obtain proactive, high impact, and creative protection via patents, trademarks, trade secrets, and copyrights. He has over a decade of experience as a subject matter expert for intellectual property assets associated with mechanical engineering, electrical engineering, and computer science technologies.

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Erin G. Mehta, Principal Counsel, Litigation & Patents, Hulu (Disney)

Erin Greenfield Mehta is an experienced patent attorney at The Walt Disney Company where she is in the Litigation Group. Her current role involves managing patent litigation for Disney’s Streaming Services, including Disney+ and Hulu, and supporting patent initiatives in the IP Group.  Before moving in-house, Erin worked at WilmerHale and before that at Ropes and Gray (formerly Fish & Neave). She studied Electrical Engineering at Clemson University and received her J.D. from Tulane Law School.  Erin lives in Manhattan Beach with her husband, also a patent lawyer, and their two kids.

Donald Min, VP of IP, Virgin Hyperloop

Specialties: Intellectual Property including patent preparation, patent prosecution, client counseling, and trademarks.

Melissa Patterson, Senior Associate, Sheppard Mullin

Melissa Patterson is an associate in the Intellectual Property Practice Group in the firm’s San Diego (Del Mar) office. Melissa focuses her practice on the preparation and prosecution of patent applications, particularly in the areas of software, computer hardware, mobile communications, AI, robotics and financial networks. She has prosecuted more than 500 U.S. and foreign patent matters. Melissa has also assisted with over 100 trademark matters, conducted non-infringement and invalidity analyses for numerous IP litigation matters and assisted with patent licensing matters.

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Michael T. Rose, Homeland Security Investigations Special Agent at IP Rights Coordination Center 

Michael Rose is a supervisory special agent with Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) and joined the Intellectual Property Rights Coordination Center in November 2020.  Mr. Rose leads the intellectual property and outreach and training sections, with operational oversight of all HSI intellectual property investigative programs.  Mr. Rose manages Operation Stolen Promise, the IPR Center’s effort in the fight against COVID-19 related fraud, focusing on the threat posed by counterfeit personal protective equipment.

Steven Shape, Managing Partner, Dennemeyer

Steven Shape is a registered patent attorney and electrical engineer who has represented preeminent technology companies in complex, high-stakes Intellectual Property litigation and foreign patent and trademark prosecution matters since 1982.

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Beverly Shin, Group VP of IP, The Beachbody Company

Beverly Shin is Group Vice President for Intellectual Property at Beachbody, a worldwide leader in health and fitness headquartered in Santa Monica, California. Prior to joining Beachbody, Ms. Shin was Vice President for Intellectual Property and Marketing for Harman International, and International Enforcement Manager for Oakley.

Shirin Tefagh – Director, IP Legal Counsel, Dexcom

Shirin Tefagh is currently Director of IP at Dexcom, where she leverages her technical background and experience in computer software and hardware to manage several key IP portfolios for the company.  Prior to this role, she served as Patent Counsel, Senior Director for Qualcomm in San Diego. Her experience in various fields of intellectual property law include patent procurement, client counseling, IP litigation, and licensing and transactions.  Shirin holds a bachelor’s in Information and Computer Science from the University of California, Irvine and a J.D. from the University of San Diego School of Law.

Nick Transier, Partner, Dinsmore & Shohl LLP

Nick Transier is an accomplished patent attorney with nearly a decade of experience in both prosecution and litigation. He currently focuses on building international patent portfolios for clients, especially in the areas of data science, including artificial intelligence and machine learning, software, telecommunications, automotive technologies, and consumer electronics. He has also defended mechanical and electrical innovations including consumer electronic devices, computer software systems, display technologies, and medical devices.

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Richard Yoon, Cepheid, Business Development Dir. Licensing and New Ventures

I am business lawyer with an intellectual property and business development emphasis. My career has taken me from a big law firm to start-up to a Fortune 500 company. Through that time I have evolved my skill sets to cover a broad range of business and legal skills. My early experience was focused particularly on patent law, including prosecution, litigation, and client counseling. In the past 10 years, I have evolved my legal expertise towards business development, licensing, and other agreements where intellectual property is a key driver of the deal. I take pride as a problem solver and someone able to bridge gaps between parties.