Distinguished IP alumni visit campus for "Careers in Intellectual Property Law" panel
Thurs, Oct. 8, 2015 -- The Palmer Center hosted a panel on "Careers in Intellectual Property Law," featuring a distinguished panel of top practitioners in IP law who described their unique career paths, provided advice on positioning for success in the IP field, and answered questions about IP law practice. Panelists include Vision Winter, Partner, O'Melveny & Meyers LLP (Pepperdine '04, Palmer Fellow), Brian Philpott, Partner, Koppel, Patrick, Heybl & Philpott (Pepperdine '05, Palmer Fellow), Paul Bost, Associate, Sheppard Mullin Richter & Hampton LLP (Vanderbilt '08); and Connor Lynch, Associate, O'Melveny & Meyers LLP, (USC '14).
Winter, who has organized this panel for the last several years to great success and student interest, also served as moderator.
Below are bios on the panelists:
Vision Winter is a partner in O'Melveny's Los Angeles office and a member of the Intellectual Property and Technology Practice within the Litigation Department. His practice focuses on intellectual property litigation, primarily in the electrical, computer science, and electronics fields. Vision is also a registered professional chemical engineer in the State of California and, before joining O'Melveny, worked at Procter & Gamble as a power and controls project engineer. He has been named a "Rising Star" in intellectual property litigation in a survey conducted by Law & Politics Media Inc. and published in Los Angeles Magazine and the Southern California edition of Super Lawyers (2009-2014).
Brian J. Philpott is a shareholder at Koppel, Patrick, Heybl & Philpott whose practice focuses on patent prosecution and litigation, trademark and copyright matters, and general international intellectual property issues. He represents a diverse clientele including individuals and companies from the fashion, entertainment, and high-tech industries. His technological expertise is in optoelectronic systems, lasers, light emitting diode applications, and semiconductor fabrication. Mr. Philpott earned a Bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering from Oklahoma State University in 2002. After graduating, he went to work in the Ultrafast Terahertz Optoelectronic Laboratory as a research assistant under Dr. Alan Cheville. In the Fall of 2002, he matriculated to the Pepperdine University School of Law where he received his Juris Doctor degree in 2005. While in law school he served as the President of the Intellectual Property Society and actively volunteered with several organizations including the Union Rescue Mission and the Adoption Law Group. He was admitted to the California Bar in January 2006. Mr. Philpott is an adjunct professor of law at Pepperdine. He currently teaches Trademarks and Unfair Competition in the spring and Patent Law in the fall.
Paul Bost is an associate in Sheppard Mullin Richter & Hampton's Intellectual Property Practice Group in the firm's Century City office. Before law school, Paul obtained a BA degree in humanities from Pepperdine.
Connor Lynch is an associate in O'Melveny's Los Angeles office and a member of the Intellectual Property and Technology practice group within the Litigation Department. Before law school, Connor obtained an electrical engineering degree from Georgia Tech. Connor possesses experience with several software and hardware languages, including Python, Objective C, C, assembly, and VHDL.