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Email: thipkins@fredlaw.com
Office: 612.492.7307
Assistant: Anise Krull, 612.492.7635
Tom is the chair of the firm’s Patents Group. He helps technology-driven clients minimize patent infringement risk by developing noninfringement and invalidity positions with respect to their competitors’ patents, while also helping protect and leverage their own technology.
Tom’s clients come to him with complex freedom-to-operate issues. He works with them to stake out noninfringement and/or invalidity positions. When circumstances warrant, he documents those positions in clear, concise written opinions.
Tom also helps protect his clients’ technology by drafting and prosecuting patent applications. His clients value his detailed understanding of their machines, mechanical and electro-mechanical devices, software, and manufacturing processes, as well as his skillful approach to working with patent examiners to move applications through to allowance.
When Tom’s clients want to leverage their patents, he assesses the likelihood of the relevant competitor’s product or process being covered by the client’s patents and then helps devise and implement an enforcement strategy.
Tom enjoys working closely with his clients to formulate comprehensive patent strategies that best advance their business objectives. His clients view him as a trusted counselor and appreciate his creativity and knowledge of the law in dealing with their wide variety of issues.
October 11, 2018
In recent remarks at the Intellectual Property Owners Association’s annual meeting, USPTO Director Andrei Iancu proposed a change to how USPTO examiners determine whether a claimed invention satisfies the patent eligibility requirements of 35 USC § 101.
September 19, 2016
The United States Supreme Court’s recent Halo Electronics v. Pulse Electronics case made it easier for a patent holder to win punitive damages in a patent infringement case.
June 30, 2015
Despite the Supreme Court’s recent Commil USA, LLC v. Cisco Systems, Inc. decision, invalidity opinions of counsel remain an important tool for mitigating patent infringement risk. Under Commil, invalidity opinions cannot be used to show that an accused infringer lacked the requisite intent to induce—i.e., the scienter element—under 35 USC § 271(b). But companies will continue to use the opinions to memorialize early-stage validity analyses as part of a broader strategy of assessing potential patent infringement risk.
January 21, 2014
By Eric D. Buss & Thomas R. Hipkins
What if someone sold you a product and then sued you for patent infringement because you used the product for its intended purpose? The doctrine of patent exhaustion guards against such a situation, and the Federal Circuit recently made an important clarification of that doctrine.
