We provide the full range of intellectual property services (other than litigation services) required by technologists, technology managers, and investors in all technology fields, with particular expertise in biotechnology, pharmaceuticals, software, and telecommunications.  While each ALG attorney has at least 10 years of patent counseling and procurement experience, we each also have significant relevant industry experience with companies such as Amgen, Amylin, Bell Labs, and Biosite and law firms such Lyon & Lyon LLP, Foley and Lardner LLP, Duane Morris, and Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati.  As such, not only do we provide exceptional legal advice, we provide that advice in a commercially meaningful context.  

Commercially relevant patent protection is critical your business.  Because each ALG attorney has significant technical expertise in one or more areas of science, we can effectively communicate with scientists and technologists to understand the complex innovations being made today in corporate and university research laboratories.  This allows us to connect with scientists and inventors and work with them from the inception of their discoveries.  Establishing an early and ongoing relationship with technological innovators, when combined with our legal expertise, enables us to procure broad, commercially important patent coverage for our clients. 

 While patents and their attendant exclusionary rights are vitally important to establishing a proprietary position for innovation, merely protecting a given invention may not be sufficient to ensure commercial success.  Today’s technology and intellectual property landscape can be complex, with multiple parties often controlling different technologies, some or all of which may be required for successful commercialization of your product or platform.  Navigating this thicket requires a thorough understanding of your technology and third party rights.  Given our experience we are well positioned to conduct these analyses.  When appropriate and if requested, we may also issue non-infringement and/or invalidity opinions.  

Commercially relevant intellectual property protection is critical to your business.   So is monetizing that property through continued research and development, commercialization, licensing, and/or acquisition.  Similarly, access to third party rights may be necessary or useful to advance your business.  In either event, we have substantial experience in ethically negotiating and/or drafting technology licenses and strategic partnering agreements on behalf of our clients.  Moreover, as intellectual property attorneys and technology experts with substantial business and transactional experience we will understand the intellectual property being licensed in order to most effectively value and protect your interest in the agreement under consideration.   

We conduct intellectual property due diligence reviews for acquiring and merging companies as well as for institutional investors and venture capitalists.  Because we represent numerous corporate clients across the entire spectrum of issues related to intellectual property, we are intimately familiar with the associated business realities.  Similarly, our work with investors and licensees informs us on what they look for in evaluating intellectual property for purposes of an investment, license, or acquisition.  

Patent procurement is only a part of our patent practice.  We also help our clients evaluate and manage their patent portfolios to maximize business value.  Intellectual property rights do not exist in a vacuum; they have meaning only when they have commercial relevance.  Moreover, they are not inexpensive to procure, maintain, enforce, or defend, and thus our clients rely on us to manage their patent portfolios.  We take a strategic approach, informed by detailed knowledge not only of a client’s patent estate but also its business, objectives, and third party rights, to provide concrete, actionable advice.