Eric J. Snustad

Shareholder

Email: esnustad@fredlaw.com
Office: 612.492.7151
Assistant: Anne Johnson, 612.492.7547

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PRIMARY SERVICES

Patents Intellectual Property IP Due Diligence

ADDITIONAL EXPERTISE

Trade Secrets Advertising, Marketing & Trademark

"I enjoy using my creativity to find ways to win."

Overview

Eric focuses on prosecuting and managing patents. He also advises clients on how to stop (or prevent) infringement of their intellectual property.

Eric is an officer and shareholder in Fredrikson & Byron’s Intellectual Property and Litigation Groups. He does a great deal of work helping clients avoid the patents of competitors. When competitors have invalid patents, Eric works with litigators to attack those patents in court or, when appropriate, he asks the Patent Office to reconsider the validity of the patents by initiating Reexaminations or Reviews.

Eric is highly skilled in a wide range of mechanical arts. For example, he has done patent work on press brake tools, turret press tools, sheet metal stamping, extrusion equipment, polymer filtering, floor cleaning vehicles, carpet extractors, vacuums, wheel bearings and other bearing assemblies, agricultural equipment, HVAC components and systems, assembly line technology, automation equipment, window products, privacy glazing products, glass making and other glass technology, medical device technology, fire-fighting equipment, log building technology, and consumer products.

Eric has worked extensively on a variety of coating technologies, particularly in connection with thin films and vacuum deposition methods. Examples include glass coatings, such as low-emissivity, solar-control, hydrophilic or photocatalytic coatings; switchable privacy glass coatings; coatings for electrolysis anodes; photovoltaic coatings; gemstone coatings; sputter deposition; ion beam processes; flash-lamp annealing; tempering; and other heat treatments. Eric has also worked on numerous inventions involving multi-layer structures, such as laminates (e.g., safety glass), polymer extrusions, lithophanes and various glazing technologies.

Eric also has particular interest in aerospace technology, especially the mechanical components used in this field, as well as products in which flow characteristics are important. He has worked on technologies involving aircraft design, floats for amphibious airplanes, aircraft landing safety warning systems, fire suppression aircraft technology, and aircraft bearing systems.

Articles & Presentations

Top 10 List of Basic Do’s and Don’ts for IP

May 1, 2018

By Eric J. Snustad & David C. West

No matter how much IP experience a person has, it can be valuable to have short, easy-to-consume reminders of the basic things a company should consider.

AIA’s Elimination of Best Mode Requirement – Open Door for Patent AND Trade Secret?

January 13, 2014

By Eric J. Snustad

Is it now possible to get a patent on the broad strokes of an invention while at the same time creating potentially never-ending trade secret protection on the cleverest aspects of the invention? In the opinion of this author, the answer is “no,” but this may change.

“Key IP Legal Trends 2018-19 in Brief – Retail,” co-authored with Ann Dunn Wessberg, The IP Book, 16^th Edition, Chapter 10, September 2018
Speaker, “Intellectual Property,” NEON Small Business Ed. Legal Series, June 2018
Speaker, “Intellectual Property Basics: Patents, Trademarks, Copyrights & Trade Secrets,” NEON Small Business Ed. Legal Series, May 2017
“6 Ways to Update Patent Prosecution Protocols Post-Nautilus,” LAW360, July 2014
Speaker, “Reading the Tea Leaves - The Impact of Early PTAB Decisions on Litigation and Prosecution Strategy,” MIPLA Stampede, May 2014
Speaker, “Interviewing Patent Examiners,” 2012 Midwest IP Institute, September 21, 2012
“Strategies for Success in a Demanding Patent Office,” co-authored with John Parzych, FredNEWS: Intellectual Property, December 8, 2008
“Fredrikson Goes to the Fair: Patent Office ‘Technology Fair,’ That Is,” Fredrikson & Byron’s Intellectual Property Focus Newsletter, co-authored with Philip M. Goldman, December 2003

Honors & Education

EDUCATION

Franklin-Pierce Law Center, LL.M., Intellectual Property, 1999
Pepperdine University School of Law, J.D., 1997
University of Minnesota, Bachelor of Aerospace Engineering and Mechanics, 1994

BAR ADMISSIONS

California Bar, 1997
Minnesota Bar, 1999
U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, 1999

HONORS

The National Law Journal, Twin Cities Legal Departments of the Year, Counsel-to-Counsel Award Winner, 2015