PATENTCAFE   Management     Board of Directors     Advisory Committee

MANAGEMENT

Andy Gibbs, Chairman and CEO

Andy Gibbs is the founder and CEO of PatentCafe (www.patentcafe.com), and IPFrontline (www.ipfrontline.com), a leading international IP magazine for patent attorneys, corporate counsel, engineers and inventors.

From 2000 to 2004 Mr. Gibbs was appointed by the United States Secretary of Commerce to two terms on the USPTO Public Patent Advisory Committee (PPAC). The 9-member PPAC advises the Patent Office on various budget, legislative and operations matters.

He is a member of the Board of Directors, Intellectual Property Owners Association (www.ipo.org), and a member of the Licensing Executives Society (www.lesi.org) and Patent Information Users Group (www.PIUG.org). He also serves on the Board of Directors of By Kids For Kids, Co. the national kid invention education initiative (www.BKFK.com).

As an international IP Thought Leader, he was a member of the esteemed panel of participants in Building a New IP Marketplace – the IBM / NY Law School WIKI project that discussed policy and process for improving patent quality, transparency, fair valuation, flexibility and global consistency. (Published 2006; English and Japanese)

Mr. Gibbs has authored a number of publications and software including: the corporate patent strategy book Essentials of Patents (Wiley & Sons, 2002 / Japanese version 2004), PatentWriter (Square One Publishing), and more than 100 articles related to IP development, strategy, licensing and management.

Mr. Gibbs regularly speaks on intellectual property including international conferences sponsored by the USPTO, Korean Patent Office, Thomson Derwent, the World Intellectual Property Organization/WIPO, (Hong Kong and Bulgaria), the US Patent & Trademark Office (session and keynote speaker), Licensing Executives Society (Annual & Regional meetings), Patent Information Users Group (annual meetings), the National Association or Patent Practitioners (annual and regional meetings) and myriad US inventor organizations.

Toussaint L. Myricks, Vice President & Chief Intellectual Property Counsel

Mr. Myricks is co-founder of the AXIOS Law Group, PLLC and brings to PatentCafe® a wealth of experience as an intellectual property lawyer, technology analyst and expert on intellectual property strategy and valuation. His legal practice focuses on the preparation and prosecution of patent applications on inventions in the electrical and software art fields involving computer software systems, computer architecture, computer networks, multimedia systems, telecommunications/signal processing applications, artificial intelligence technologies and digital audio.

As the former Chief Patent Counsel for Vulcan Inc., the company formed by Microsoft co-founder Paul G. Allen, he developed, managed and established the strategic direction of its worldwide intellectual property portfolio of patents, copyrights, trademarks and trade secrets. He also performed due diligence on intellectual property portfolios of target companies for acquisition and investment purposes.

Prior to joining Vulcan Inc., Mr. Myricks was an associate with the prestigious intellectual property law firm of Christensen, O’Connor, Johnson & Kindness, LLP, and a consulting expert with the Law and Economics Consulting Group.

Mr. Myricks holds degrees in electrical engineering from M.I.T and the University of Washington, and degrees in law from the Franklin Pierce Law Center. He is a registered patent attorney with the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office and a registered patent agent with the Canadian Intellectual Property Office. He is licensed to practice law in the State of Washington, in the District of Columbia and before the United States Supreme Court. He has had or currently maintains memberships with several major legal associations including the Washington State Bar Association, the King County Bar Association, the American Bar Association and the American Intellectual Property Law Association. He is also the former Chair of the Seattle Chapter of the Licensing Executives Society and a member of its Intellectual Property Valuation Section.

Stephanie Gibbs, Chief Technical Officer

Stephanie Gibbs is the principle architect of PatentCafe’s patent search and intellectual property management software solutions. She is expert in large-scale database development, SQL Server, VB, ASP, Latent Semantic Analysis search engine technology. Her nearly 30 years in software development have focused on large-scale integrated software applications,

Previously she was founder and President of End If Software, Inc., a financial and manufacturing applications developer with clients such as Alcoa Electronic Packaging, Silicon Graphics, TRW, and Novell. End If products acquired by Solomon Software / Great Plains are now integrated into Microsoft’s Solomon accounting solutions. She was also first MIS Manager at the Apple Computer Macintosh factory in Fremont, CA., and enterprise software application developer for ASK Computer Systems. She is an inventor with various software patents pending.

Ms. Gibbs is a Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer (MSCE), and earned her Masters in Systems Management at University of Southern California.

 

BOARD OF DIRECTORS

James Bertonis, Director

29 years of executive and product development experience characterized by pioneering new markets with innovative wireless technology. Currently Mr. Bertonis is CEO of Azure Communications Inc., which develops and manufactures smart Wi-Fi and WiMAX products. He was previously the founder and CEO of Advanced Radio Cells Inc. (ARCi), making the company the industry leader in Wireless DOCSIS broadband technology. After successfully leading the merger of ARCi and CoWave Networks, Mr. Bertonis served as CTO of Arcwave Inc.

James graduated in 1976 with a BSEE from Syracuse University, and in 1986 received a MBA (Finance) from Santa Clara University.

Donald Grant Kelly, Director

Don Kelly is chief executive of Intellectual Asset Management Associates, LLC, an IP consultancy and patent law practice based in Alexandria, VA. Prior to establishing IAMA in 2002, Kelly served as CEO of the prestigious Academy of Applied Science, a nonprofit corporation founded in 1963 with a mission to foster innovation and establish a global forum for exploration of educational, scientific and legal issues. For many years prior to joining the Academy, Donald was a longtime senior executive with the US Patent & Trademark Office where he directed patent examining divisions and served as USPTO chief of staff. He established the USPTO's innovative Office of Independent Inventor Programs, and the award-winning national classroom initiative, Project XL.

As adjunct professor, Don Kelly taught patent law at Franklin Pierce Law Center in 2001. Currently, he is visiting lecturer at Fordham University’s Graduate School of Business and MIT’s Sloan School of Management, and serves on the workshop faculty of Mohawk Research, Inc. He has served two terms as a standing committee chair for the Intellectual Property Owners (IPO) Organization, and for three years on the faculty for Licensing Executives Society (LES) professional development programs.

He studied Aerospace and Mechanical Engineering at Virginia Tech where he received a BS-ME.

Nader Henry-Amin, Director

Mr. Henry-Amin is President and CEO of Custom Marble, Inc., a leading manufacturer of cultured marble products in South Florida.

Previously he was CIO of WebGain Inc., a leading producer of e-business development environments.
Mr. Henry-Amin's experience spans a number of notable consumer and e-business corporations where he has held instrumental executive positions including CIO and VP of IT at PeoplePC, Inc., where he managed international business development of the $750 million Internet retail company, and Senior Director of Systems Development at The Gap where he was responsible for international ERP infrastructure. His experience also includes executive positions at Pepsico and Bristol-Myers Corporation.

He holds an MS degree in computer information systems from the University of Evansville, Indiana, and a BS degree in commerce from Ein Shams University, Cairo, Egypt.

 

ADVISORY COMMITTEE

Stephen Fox, Advisor

Formerly Vice President and Deputy General Counsel for intellectual property at Hewlett-Packard Company when he retired from HP in October, 2005 after 38 years with the Company. For 19 years, he managed the intellectual property section of HP's legal department, with overall responsibility for about 100 professionals in Europe, Asia and the United States. He was located at HP headquarters in Palo Alto, California

Mr. Fox received a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering from Northwestern University, and his Juris Doctorate from George Washington University Law School.

He is past president and current member of the Association of Corporate Patent Counsel, a past Board member of Intellectual Property Owners Inc., and a current Board member of the National Inventors Hall of Fame. He also has served as a Federal appointee to the USPTO Patent Public Advisory Committee. Steve is a member of the Licensing Executives Society, the American Intellectual Property Law Association and the American Bar Association.

Dr. Nir Kossovsky

Founder, President and CEO of Technology Option Capital, LLC, where he provides financial and risk reduction strategies to discover, realize and protect intangible asset value.

For the past 25 years, Dr. Kossovsky has held senior leadership and consulting roles for technology-based companies providing a range of financial services. He is founder and CEO of Johnson & Higgins, an IP amalgamation company created with a client’s patents, outsourced technical expertise, and an acquired brand. He was founder and CEO of Patent & License Exchange, Inc. (today, plx systems), an international intellectual property financial systems firm that helped transform intellectual property rights into financial instruments.

Previously, Dr. Kossovsky was a tenured faculty member at the UCLA School of Medicine where he founded the Biomaterials Bioreactivity Characterization Laboratory. He also founded Medical Materials & Devices, Inc. where he served as a technical and forensic consultant to medical device, bio & nanomaterials clients.

Dr. Kossovsky earned an MD from the University of Chicago Pritzker School of Medicine, an MBA from the University of Southern California Marshall School of Business, a BA in the Philosophy of Science as a Chancellor’s Scholar from the University of Pittsburgh, and is a graduate of the Navy War College.

Irv Rappaport, Advisor

30+-year career in the intellectual property field. Co-founder, Managing Director and Senior IP Counsel of IP Checkups LLC - Company provides competitive patent portfolio landscape maps and analysis for companies and investment firms. Previously Vice President Intellectual Property & Co-Founder, Aurigin Systems, a software platform that organizes and analyzes patent portfolios. Mr. Rappaport is a co-inventor of a portfolio of 15 issued U.S. patents and corresponding international patents.

Vice President & Assoc. General Counsel, National Semiconductor Corp.; Independent Consultant for Intel, Associate General Counsel for Intellectual Property and Licensing, Apple Computer; Associate General Counsel & Assistant Secretary, Bally Manufacturing Corporation; Chief Patent Counsel, Data General Corporation.

Appointment, by three U.S. Secretaries of Commerce and two U.S. Trade Representatives to the Industry Functional Advisory Committee on Intellectual Property for Trade Policy Matters (1987-94), Former Board Member, International Anti-counterfeiting Coalition, Member, American Bar Association, American Intellectual Property Law Association, Licensing Executives Society

John Williamson, Advisor

Partner Kirkpatrick & Lockhart Nicholson Graham LLP. Previously Assistant General Counsel IP for PPG Industries, Inc. and served as Chief Patent Counsel from 1996 – 2000. He served as President of Intellectual Property Owners (IPO) from 2002 – 2004.

Previously, Mr. Williamson was Assistant General Counsel and Group Manager for Westinghouse Electric Corporation where he was responsible for intellectual property law group of the company including major businesses in energy systems, defense electronics, power generation, refrigeration, and broadcasting.
Additionally, he was General Patent Counsel, Allegheny International, Inc.; Product Engineer for Bendix Corporation - Atomic Energy Commission facility project operated by Fortune 150 Bendix Corporation.