Kevin Laurence

Kevin Laurence is a Founding Member of Laurence & Phillips, with over 30 years of experience in patent law.  He represents patent owners and petitioners in mission-critical inter partes review (IPR) and post-grant review (PGR) proceedings at the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO). He is also experienced with other post-grant proceedings having handled many high-profile reexaminations and reissues, which enables him to develop comprehensive post-grant strategies.  He leverages his post-grant experience in prosecution matters to obtain patents for his clients that will survive challenges.

He has been recognized as a leading practitioner in the United States for post-grant proceedings every year since 2012 by Intellectual Asset Management (IAM) in IAM Patent 1000. IAM recently noted that Kevin Laurence “is a trailblazing patent strategist, seasoned PTAB lead counsel, savvy prosecutor and respected author and educator. For worldly wisdom on patent law, he’s an absolute must.” IAM also previously reported that “Kevin Laurence is a mastermind when it comes to post-grant proceedings with a level of experience that is hard to beat” and that he “knows all the details of his cases and is extraordinarily perceptive at a strategic level, too.” He has also received consistent recognition from other prominent rankings including Best Lawyers in America, Managing Intellectual Property, and Chambers USA. Best Lawyers in America named Mr. Laurence their 2016 “Lawyer of the Year” in patent law for Washington, D.C.

Mr. Laurence has taught a course as an adjunct professor at the George Washington University Law School on USPTO post-grant proceedings since 2015.  He served as an instructor for Patent Resources Group (“PRG”) in courses on post-grant proceedings during 2009–2019. He is a co-author of a two-volume treatise titled Post-Grant Patent Practice provided in conjunction with the PRG courses and updated at least annually for over a decade.  He co-authored over 40 articles for Intellectual Property Today magazine on post-grant patent topics during 2010–2014.  He served as vice chair of the Intellectual Property Owners Association’s U.S. Post-Grant Patent Office Practice committee during 2012–2015. He served on the Interim Board of Directors for the PTAB Bar Association during 2016–2017.

Mr. Laurence provides patent-related services across a broad technological spectrum including chemical fields, pharmaceuticals, medical devices, mechanical and electromechanical systems and devices, semiconductor fabrication, software, and other technologies.  In addition to his post-grant practice, he focuses on all phases of patent procurement, portfolio management, preparation of non-infringement and invalidity opinions, product clearance analysis, due diligence evaluations, pre-litigation evaluations, strategic counseling for asserting patent rights or responding to patent infringement allegations, and serving as an expert witness.