International IP Summit

Ed Kelly (Moderator)

Edward J. Kelly is an alumni of Boston College Law School and a retired partner of Ropes & Gray, LLP. He practiced Intellectual Property law where he provided advice and legal opinions on deals and transactions and he represented clients with appeals at the U.S. Patent Trial and Appeals Board, oppositions before the European patent office, re-examination proceedings at the U.S. Patent Office, arbitrations and other contentious matters. He also provided strategies for securing patents, trademarks and copyrights to a broad range of clients. Prior to law school, Ed was an electrical engineer at Raytheon Company and at other companies, including a medical device company and a robotics firm.

Chris de Mauny

Chris is a patent litigation specialist at Bird & Bird based in San Francisco. He advises clients from a range of industries including tech, life sciences and sustainable technologies. He is licensed to practice law in England & Wales and registered as a Foreign Legal Consultant with the State Bar of California.

Chris was called to the English Bar in 2006 and practiced in specialist intellectual property chambers until early 2011 when he joined Bird & Bird, a firm known for its focus on technology clients. Bird & Bird is one of only two firms in the top ranking for IP by Chambers Global. In April 2024 Chris relocated to San Francisco to co-head Bird & Bird's office which brings Bird & Bird’s European and Asia-Pac expertise to US soil. He has been ranked or recognised by a range of publications including IAM, Managing Intellectual Property, Legal 500, the peer-nominated Expert Guides.

Chris has represented a range of clients from multinational corporations to individual traders in disputes involving patents, trademarks and passing off, design rights, copyright, and rights in confidential and/or private information. His recent work has focused primarily on patent litigation in the life sciences, electronics and sustainable technologies.

In Europe, Chris is a member of EPLAW, the UK's IP Bar Association, the Chartered Institute of Patent Attorneys and AIPPI. In California, Chris is an Advisory Board member of SFIPLA and a member LAIPLA and BASF.

Charlen Larsen

As a US lawyer and English solicitor, Charles (Chuck) Larsen provides clients sophisticated multijurisdictional counsel in intellectual property portfolio strategy, transactions and disputes, with a particular emphasis in bioengineering and the medical technology space. He is licensed to practice before the US Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO), the European Patent Office (EPO), and the courts of England and Wales.

Chuck actively counsels on transatlantic disputes, including US District Court cases, Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) proceedings, Reexaminations, EPO Oppositions and litigation. His team is one of the first international practices to bring an action in Europe’s Unified Patent Court.

Matthew Shapiro

Matthew Shapiro is a trial lawyer in the intellectual property litigation group, with more than a decade of experience across all major patent venues, including patent-centric district courts, the International Trade Commission, and the Patent Trial and Appeal Board.

Matthew represents clients from pre-suit investigation through appeal, with experience managing the day-to-day activities of large-scale litigations, leading discovery, damages and technical teams, developing case strategies, and preparing and presenting witnesses at trial. His experience spans a broad range of technical fields, including computer-based technologies in the consumer electronics, industrial process management, insurance, digital printing, and internet-based service industries.Matthew also has considerable experience with post-grant proceedings before the United States Patent and Trademark Office, where he has served as counsel in more than thirty proceedings. He also serves as the group’s UPC specialist advising on the intersection between US and UPC litigation.

David Olson (Moderator)

David Olson is an associate professor and the former Faculty Director of the Program on Innovation and Entrepreneurship. He teaches patent law, intellectual property law, antitrust law, and various seminars. His research and writing primarily focus on patents, copyrights, antitrust, and incentives for innovation and competition. Since joining BC Law in 2007, he has been recognized for his teaching excellence and contributions. In 2011, he received the Business & Law Society Faculty Award for Achievement in Business & Law. In 2012, he received the Professor Emil Slizewski Award for Faculty Excellence. For one semester in 2015, Olson served as a visiting professor at Pontifical Catholic University, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, where he conducted research and taught a course on intellectual property.

Olson has published scholarly articles on patent law, copyright law, antitrust, music licensing, and first amendment copyright issues. His writing has been cited in Supreme Court and other legal opinions. He has testified before the U.S. Congress on matters of drug patents, FDA regulation, and antitrust. The media frequently seeks Olson’s insights and opinions. He has been quoted in the Wall Street Journal, Associated Press, and Reuters, among others. He has appeared as a guest panelist on WBUR’s Radio Boston, WAMU's Kojo Namdi Show, and Public Radio Canada. His op-eds have appeared in the Chicago Tribune, Washington Times, and The Hill.

Olson came to Boston College from Stanford Law School's Center for Internet and Society, where he conducted research on patent law and litigated copyright fair use impact cases. Before entering academia, Olson practiced law as a patent litigator. He clerked for Judge Jerry Smith of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. 

Kati Pajak Strzelczyk

Kati Pajak Strzelczyk is an experienced attorney with a robust background advising startups, emerging growth companies, and venture funds. Currently serving as Counsel - AI (Innovation & Trust), Commercial & Procurement at OpenTable and KAYAK, Kati focuses on ensuring the responsible and compliant use of generative AI technologies. She advises on the legal and regulatory aspects of AI innovation to foster trust in AI technologies. She also is responsible for commercial and procurement contracting, negotiating and drafting agreements that drive the company's strategic initiatives.

Kati’s legal career began as a Summer Associate at Mintz where she continued as a Corporate Associate for over five years. At Mintz, her practice spanned VC financing, mergers and acquisitions, corporate governance, and other commercial transactions as well as negotiates licensing and commercial contracts. Prior to law school, Kati was a Senior Consultant at IBM. Kati has her JD from Boston College Law School and BA from the George Washington University.

Benjamin Brown

Ben is a seasoned, business-minded attorney with an engineering background and an MBA. He currently serves as Assistant General Counsel, Chief IP Counsel, and Head of Government Affairs at Onto Innovation, Inc. He started his career at IBM working as an electrical engineer and transitioned to an IP attorney at WilmerHale in Boston & NYC, and then as Assistant General Counsel of IP at Analog Devices. He has counseled business leaders, inventors, and employees, in entities ranging from small startups to large companies, on a wide range of legal matters, including Intellectual Property, commercial agreements, licensing, investigations, litigation, M&A, government affairs, and export control.

Georgina Jones Suzuki

Georgina Jones Suzuki is a strategic IP transactions attorney with a practice at the intersection of life sciences and technology. These transactions include technology licensing and transfer, collaborations, joint ventures, mergers and acquisitions, supply and distribution arrangements, royalty monetizations, and other strategic agreements. Her clients include public and private companies, academic institutions and investors, including global pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies and leading private equity funds. Georgina’s breadth of experience working with both life science and technology companies, as well as her secondment with a global pharmaceutical company, also enables her to advise clients in the digital health space (including on data, machine learning and artificial intelligence). 

Georgina has worked extensively with clients on licensing and collaboration deals involving artificial intelligence, machine learning and data.

Kevin Powers (Moderator)

Kevin Powers is the Director of the “new” Master of Legal Studies in Cybersecurity, Risk & Governance Program at Boston College Law School, where he is a Lecturer-in-Law. He was previously the Founder and Director for the Master of Science in Cybersecurity Policy and Governance Program at Boston College, and an Assistant Professor of the Practice in Boston College’s Carroll School of Management’s Business Law and Society Department. With more than 25 years of combined cybersecurity, data privacy, business, law enforcement, military, national security, higher education, and teaching experience, he has worked as an analyst and an attorney for the U.S. Department of Justice, U.S. Navy, U.S. Department of Defense, law firms in Boston and Washington, D.C., and as the General Counsel for an international software company based in Seattle, Washington.  Along with his teaching at Boston College, Kevin is a Cybersecurity Research Affiliate at the MIT Sloan School of Management and a Lecturer for MIT Sloan’s Executive Education Program - “Cybersecurity Governance for the Board of Directors.” He also taught courses at the U.S. Naval Academy, where he was the Deputy General Counsel to the Superintendent.  

Kevin serves as the Chair of the Board of Trustees for Boston College High School, a Board Director for Reading Cooperative Bank, and a Cybersecurity Advisor for both HYCU (Backed by Bain Capital Ventures) and Acium. Kevin is also an expert witness and consultant with the Analysis Group. Previously, Kevin served as a member of the Boston College Law School Business Advisory Council (2018-2023) and served as the Panel Lead (2016-2017) for the Collegiate Working Group for the U.S. Department of Homeland Security's National Initiative for Cybersecurity Education (NICE). Kevin, a Navy Veteran, regularly provides expert commentary regarding cybersecurity and national security concerns for local, national, and international media outlets.

Edward Machin

Edward Machin is counsel in the data, privacy and cybersecurity group, based in London. He provides clear and business-focused advice on a wide range of legal and regulatory issues in the rapidly evolving areas of privacy, data protection and cyber security, artificial intelligence and digital regulation. Secondments at data-rich businesses in the life sciences and market research sectors have given Edward a deep understanding of what clients want – and these experiences inform his approach to providing user-friendly legal and commercial solutions to organisations across Europe, the U.S. and Asia. In the Legal 500 UK 2024, Edward is described as “excellent” and “knowledgeable, responsive [and] practical”. 

Edward’s practice encompasses regulatory compliance, advisory and transactional work for founders, start-ups, corporates, venture capitalists and asset managers across the technology, life sciences and healthcare, financial and professional services, food and beverage, consumer goods, entertainment and media sectors. He regularly advises on the development and operationalisation of global compliance programmes, new products and services, complex international data transfer issues, and emerging technologies and regulatory trends (such as the use of artificial intelligence, digital assets and alternative data).In addition, Edward has particular experience with crisis and incident management. He helps clients respond to requests from law enforcement agencies and data protection authorities, and frequently advises on personal data breaches, security events and contentious subject rights requests. He also works closely with colleagues across the firm on the data protection aspects of internal investigations and litigation matters.

Hiba Hafiz

Hiba Hafiz is an associate professor with tenure and a McHale Faculty Research Scholar. She joined BC Law as an assistant professor in 2018, and teaches and writes in labor and employment law, antitrust law, and administrative law. Her work focuses on strengthening workers’ bargaining power and legal solutions to labor market concentration and inequality.

Hafiz has published or has forthcoming articles in the University of Chicago Law Review, Columbia Law Review, University of Pennsylvania Law Review, Michigan Law Review, Duke Law Journal, Washington University Law Review, Wisconsin Law Review, and Cardozo Law Review, among other law journals. Her writing has been featured in news and radio outlets, and academic blogs and podcasts, including the New York Times, The Atlantic, WBUR, Law and Political Economy Blog, Washington Center for Equitable Growth’s Competitive Edge series, ProMarket Blog, Competition Policy International’s Antitrust Chronicle, Columbia Law School Blue Sky Blog, Our Curious Amalgam, and The Sling. She has served as an Expert Advisor to the Federal Trade Commission and is currently an affiliate fellow at Yale University's Thurman Arnold Project, as well as a Fellow at the Roosevelt Institute.

Between 2011 and 2013, Hafiz clerked for Judge Juan R. Torruella of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit and Judge José L. Linares of the U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey. After clerking, she practiced law in the Antitrust Practice Group at Cohen Milstein Sellers & Toll in Washington, D.C., where she represented plaintiffs in antitrust class actions against pharmaceutical companies and employers. Hafiz left practice to become a Harry A. Bigelow Teaching Fellow and lecturer at the University of Chicago Law School, where she taught legal research and writing and a seminar on work law in the new economy.

After graduating with a B.A. from Wellesley College, Hafiz completed a Ph.D. in comparative literature at Yale University. During her doctoral program, she served as a union organizer for graduate students and joined broader campaigns to organize service sector workers. She enrolled in Columbia Law School to further study workers' rights. After graduating in 2010, she represented farmworker victims of trafficking as a David W. Leebron Human Rights Fellow at the International Rights Advocates. 

Duncan Willson

Duncan Willson is a Senior Advisor to the Under Secretary of Commerce for Intellectual Property and Director of the United States Patent & Trademark Office (USPTO), helping to develop and deploy Under Secretary initiatives across the agency. For over 15 years, Mr. Willson has provided strategic advice to companies and governments on protecting business-critical IP and technology, primarily in China. Most recently, Duncan returned to the USPTO in September 2023 after a five-year term at the U.S. Embassy in Beijing, China as IP Counselor. While there, he advised the U.S. Ambassador and a range of U.S. government agencies on how China’s technology policies and practices threaten U.S. economic security, while counseling hundreds of U.S. individuals and businesses on how to assess and address IP-related risks unique to the PRC. In his role as IP Counselor, Mr. Willson leveraged his fluent Mandarin Chinese to engage extensively with PRC government and industry stakeholders, building relationships that allowed the Embassy to obtain favorable outcomes for U.S. entities in China, despite increasing challenges in the bilateral relationship. 

Prior to his appointment as IP Counselor, Mr. Willson was detailed to the White House Office of the U.S. IP Enforcement Coordinator (IPEC), where he worked with the IPEC and White House officials to draft the IP components of strategic policies and trade-related matters, in addition to providing his expertise on PRC IP laws, policies, and practices. Before his detail to the Office of the IPEC, Mr. Willson served as an Attorney Advisor in the USPTO’s Office of Policy and International Affairs, where he handled bilateral IP policy matters relating to China. His responsibilities included developing and negotiating U.S. positions on IP matters; advising the U.S. government and business community on legal developments in China; and designing and supervising IP-related technical assistance to the PRC government.

Prior to joining public service, Mr. Willson was a senior associate with the law firm of Baker & McKenzie in Beijing, China, where he provided advice on a wide-range of IPR issues, including advising on IP protection and enforcement, licensing, and dispute resolution. His clients included some of the largest consumer electronics, entertainment, apparel, and personal care companies in the world.

Mr. Willson received his law degree from the George Washington University Law School, and holds two bachelor’s degrees from the University of Washington. He is a Seattle native, an avid runner, an unrelenting gardener, and is licensed to practice law in California.

David McIntosh (Moderator)

David McIntosh is a partner in the firm’s life sciences and intellectual property transactions practice groups. Recognized by Chambers and other industry publications as a leading practitioner in his field, David advises a wide range of companies, investors, and institutions primarily in the life sciences industry in strategic transactions involving intellectual property, with particular focus on strategic collaborations, technology licensing, mergers and acquisitions, joint ventures, supply and distribution arrangements, and co-promotion and marketing agreements.David’s practice focuses on the life sciences industry, but he also has had extensive experience advising companies and investors in the technology and branded product industries with respect to strategic transactions involving intellectual property as well as day-to-day commercial and corporate matters. David also provides guidance on integrating advice from other legal experts, such as foreign counsel, regulatory advisors, litigators, and other specialists, so that it aligns with companies’ corporate strategy and practices.

David Peloquin

David Peloquin is a partner in the health care group who advises clients on a wide range of legal and regulatory issues in the area of clinical research and related activities. David counsels academic medical centers, life sciences companies, information technology companies and other clients that sponsor, support and conduct research. With a broad client base and knowledge of a range of laws and regulations, from the Common Rule and FDA regulations, to HIPAA and GDPR, to state and federal fraud and abuse laws—David offers clients clear, practical advice on how the complex legal landscape intersects with an array of research activities.

In an area that is constantly evolving, David advises clients on the latest guidance across a range of issues. In addition to his advisory work, David collaborates with the private equity group to conduct regulatory diligence of clinical research investments, and works with the firm’s litigation practice on government and civil investigations involving clinical research.

Nicholas Caezza

Nick Caezza is currently the VP, Deputy General Counsel at Butterfly Network, Inc. (NYSE: BFLY), a manufacturer and seller of semiconductor based handheld ultrasound devices and related software.  Previously, Nick served as in-house counsel at Columbia Care Inc. (NEO: CBST) and American Tower Corporation (NYSE: AMT), where he counseled business units on regulatory and corporate matters.  Nick received his JD from Suffolk University Law School and holds a dual BA from University of Massachusetts - Amherst in political science and legal studies.  

Dan Zheng

Dan Zheng is a Senior Director of Business Development at Center for External Innovation at Takeda. In this role, she is responsible for BD transactions in oncology, cell therapies, and large molecule platform technologies, as well as leading efforts to explore and build strategic partnerships. Before joining Takeda, Dan spent 8 years at Sanofi partnering, where she held increasingly senior roles in both APAC regional team and the global team. Her last role at Sanofi was Senior Director of Global Transactions, where she successfully closed over 10 key transactions across oncology, immunology, rare diseases, and technology platforms. Dan began her career as a management consultant at ZS Associates, where she advised top global pharmaceutical companies on a broad range of business issues. Dan holds a PhD in Biological Sciences from Northwestern University and a BS in Biochemistry from Nanjing University.