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Tuesday,
June 17, 2008
Patents, Licensing and Venturing
Collaboration to Commercialization
Meeting
Overview
The EntreTech Forum's June 17th panel discussion
focuses on intellectual property, licensing and the technology
transfer process out of the region's leading academic programs.
The core question put before our panelists will be: How is
intellectual property managed via the patent and/or licensing
process as academic research moves from concept to
commercialization? The panel will be asked to bring
meaningful examples to the discussion to emphasis the EntreTech
Forum's focus on real-world inputs/outputs/incentives/issues.
Keynote:
 Stan
Schurgin, Partner, Weingarten, Schurgin, Gagnebin & Lebovici
As the Senior Managing Partner of the firm which
he joined in 1967, Stan Schurgin's practice extends to all facets of
intellectual property law. He is a specialist in the licensing of
technology and patents and in counseling corporate and university
clients in patent, licensing, trademark and other intellectual
property matters, and has extensive experience in the establishment
and maintenance of internal company procedures for the management of
intellectual property. With over thirty-five years in practice, Mr.
Schurgin is often called upon to evaluate intellectual property as
part of start-up, acquisition and financing ventures, to conduct due
diligence studies, and to render legal opinions on issues of
infringement, validity and ownership of intellectual property. He
also provides counsel in technological transactions and in the
strategic use and protection of intellectual property. Mr. Schurgin
began his career as a patent engineer and then as a corporate patent
attorney at a large international electronics and communications
company where he was engaged in the protection and analysis of a
broad range of technology, particularly electronic systems, and in
government contract patent and data requirements. He holds a
Bachelor of Science Degree in Electrical Engineering from
Northeastern University (1959) and obtained his law degree, cum
laude, from the New England School of Law (1964), where he was an
Adjunct Professor of patent law for ten years. He has organized and
participates in numerous seminars, conferences and continuing legal
education programs on many different intellectual property topics.
Moderator:
 Jerry O'Connor, Partner, Foley Hoag
Jerry O’Connor has a wide-ranging business law practice that focuses
on corporate finance transactions, mergers and acquisitions,
securities law and intellectual property matters. He represents
clients in a variety of industries, including software and
information technology, advanced and renewable energy,
manufacturing, pharmaceuticals, venture capital and professional
services. Jerry represents buyers and sellers of public and private
companies. He assists early-stage companies with formation,
securities offerings, employment and intellectual property issues.
He advises public companies and their directors and officers on
securities law, Sarbanes-Oxley compliance and reporting obligations.
Jerry’s practice has particular emphasis on advising early stage
software and energy technology companies, representing them in
negotiating and carrying out strategic alliance and joint venture
agreements.
Panelists:
 Tony
Pirri, Director, Northeastern University Technology Transfer Team
Dr. Pirri is
currently director of NEU’s Tech Transfer team, with shared
responsibility for driving an increase in the number of university
faculty/industry collaborations. Dr. Pirri has over 30 years of
experience in the field of technology commercialization. After
obtaining a doctorate in engineering from Brown University, Dr.
Pirri went to work with a major corporate research laboratory for
several years before co-founding a technology development company
that was successful in commercializing technologies seeded with
government funding.
 Bruce
Horwitz, President, TechRoadMap
Dr. Horwitz received his doctorate in Optics in
1976 and spent over twenty-five years in R&D and new product
development activities, functioning at various times as an
individual contributor, program manager, department manager at Itek
Optical Systems, Vice President of R&D for MicroE Systems and
Director of Optical Technology for AXSUN Technologies. Recognizing
the need to bridge the gap between technologists and patent
attorneys, Dr. Horwitz has been helping companies get the right
patents, at the right point in the development cycle, since 2000,
when he started TechRoadmap Inc.
 Linda
Plano, Associate Director, Massachusetts Technology Transfer Center
Dr. Plano is the Associate Director of the Massachusetts Technology
Transfer Center (MTTC), an organization dedicated to the
commercialization of technologies developed in the state's nonprofit
research institutions. The MTTC has a number of programs designed to
support entrepreneurs, including technology showcases such as the
Conference on Clean Energy, Platform events in which entrepreneurs
pitch their ideas to a small, hand-picked audience of investors and
industry professionals for strategic feedback, and semiannual awards
programs to provide prototype development funds to inventors in
Massachusetts' nonprofit research institutions. Dr. Plano is
committed to the development of the Clean Energy Cluster in
Massachusetts and the region. She helped co-found the ESIG as well
as serving as chair of the Ignite Clean Energy (ICE) Business
Presentation Competition for the last two years, which has provided
mentoring and networking opportunities to over 100 teams in its
first three years as well as more than half a million dollars in
cash and prizes to the winners. She is also a Visiting Scholar at
the Laboratory for Energy and the Environment (LFEE) at MIT for her
volunteer work in developing materials to communicate clean energy
issues to the general public as well as training in entrepreneurship
for student inventors. Dr. Plano did her undergraduate work in
Physics at MIT, and earned her PhD at Stanford University in
Materials Science and Engineering.
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