Date/Time
Date(s) - Thu 08/27/2020
12:00 pm - 1:00 pm
As the country grapples with the effects of systemic racism, reflection about how bias impacts our daily lives is top of mind for many. Bias, racism, and microaggressions have never been more important to engage and reflect on. How do these ideas and behaviors impact IP Departments? How do these ideas affect our ability to recruit and retain diverse talent? How do we influence our colleagues, clients, and companies to truly acknowledge the prevalence of these issues and commit to actions aimed at creating a more diverse, inclusive, welcoming, stigma-free IP Department.
The SFIPLA is pleased to welcome IP Department diversity and inclusion thought leaders Allen Lo (VP of IP at Facebook, Inc.) and Cyndi Wheeler (Sr. Director of IP at Slack Technologies, Inc.) for a panel discussion of strategies for eliminating bias and increasing diversity in IP Departments with Ty Lord (Partner at Kilpatrick Townsend & Stockton).
SPEAKERS BIOS:
Allen Lo is Deputy General Counsel and Vice President for Product, IP, and Legal Operations at Facebook, where he leads a team of over 250 legal professionals. His team provides primary legal counsel for product launches, product compliance with new legal obligations, and product incident support. They are also responsible for protecting Facebook’s intellectual property rights, which include four of the world’s most valuable brands (Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, and Oculus) and a global patent portfolio of 20,000 assets. His team also handles removal of infringing content on the platforms. In addition, he serves on the Legal D&I steering committee and is executive sponsor for the API group in Legal.
Cyndi Wheeler is Senior Director of Intellectual Property at Slack Technologies, Inc., and is responsible for all aspects of Slack’s global intellectual property practice, including patents, trademarks, licensing, litigation, and open source. Prior to joining Slack, Cyndi spent 11 years at Apple on the patent and litigation teams, where she managed the patent portfolio for the original iPhone and litigated numerous competitor and NPE patent cases in venues around the world. Before working at Apple, she was an engineer and patent attorney at Intel. Cyndi is on the board of ChIPs, a nonprofit organization geared toward advancing women in law, technology & policy, and is chair of the ChIPs Scholarship Committee and a member of the ChIPs Diversity & Inclusion Committee.
MODERATOR BIO:
Ty Lord specializes in trademark and advertising counseling and litigation. She represents brand owners across a broad spectrum of industries including sports and intimate apparel, consumer products, and hospitality. Ms. Lord leverages her diverse background to advance her clients’ business objectives. She regularly partners with clients to develop practical and creative solutions to legal issues. Her approach to litigation has led to excellent results for clients in federal courts across the United States and in cancellation and opposition proceedings in the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. Ms. Lord also proactively advises clients on a variety of issues to minimize the risk of disputes while maximizing the visibility of clients’ brand, including trademark clearance and portfolio management and managing social media advertising campaigns and the intellectual property and right of publicity issues that accompany them. Ms. Lord currently serves as a member of her firm’s Executive Committee.
Date: Thursday, August 27, 2020
Time: 12pm-1pm
Place: ZOOM (login credential details to be provided prior to program meeting)
Cost: FREE
Click here to register.
The San Francisco Intellectual Property Law Association is an approved provider of California MCLE credit, and certifies that the above activity meets the requirements for one hour of participatory and elimination bias credits.
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