IP Issues in Startups - What You Really Need to Know

Abstract: 

Starting a new company is both exciting and challenging.  For a technology startup, one of the main components of the business that not only adds value but helps to differentiate your products and services is the company's intellectual property.  But with all the work to be done at such an early stage, it is hard to know what is really needed to effectively develop and manage the company's intellectual property efforts.  This presentation will provide a number of practical and effective tips to handle most of the common intellectual property issues faced by a technology startup. 

Dr. Francisco Castro is currently Associate General Counsel, Intellectual Property, at the first publicly traded pure-play quantum computing company, IonQ, headquartered in College Park, MD.  Dr. Castro received his Ph.D. from Drexel University in Philadelphia, PA, where he studied applied and computational semiconductor physics.  After an early career in engineering as a principal research engineer at Lucent Technologies (now Nokia) and then at Motorola outside Chicago, IL, Dr. Castro attended Chicago-Kent College of Law and transitioned to a career in intellectual property law that started at the Northern Virginia office of Silicon Valley-based law firm Cooley LLP.  Most recently, and just prior to joining IonQ, Dr. Castro was Counsel at Arent Fox LLP in Washington, DC.