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Week of 22 October 1999 Vol. III, No. 11 Feature Article Intellectual property calling young lawyers By David J. Craig In the early 1990s, Val Gurvits had a difficult time finding lawyers with enough knowledge of licensing to work for his software development company. Such expertise was vital because in almost every contract his company entered into, lawyers were needed to outline who had access to trade secrets such as computer codes. "I worked with too many lawyers who didn't understand what we did for a living," says Gurvits (LAW'99), then director of Connecticut-based Document Systems. "They may have been competent as attorneys in general, but if they couldn't understand how licensing worked in the computer field, they could only help us so much." Gurvits wasn't alone. For years the booming high-tech industry has demanded more attorneys trained in intellectual property law than schools could churn out. The BU School of Law responded in 1994 by offering a concentration in intellectual property law, as have law schools around the country. The school has since graduated 78 attorneys trained in the area, and about one-third of all students in the school now elect to take at least one intellectual property course. "Partners in law firms that practice intellectual property are now the highest paid specialty attorneys," says Michael Meurer, a LAW professor who teaches intellectual property. "Demand for IP courses is way up." A burgeoning field Businesses have always kept secrets integral to their success. The recipe for Coca-Cola is a classic example. But while traditional manufacturers hold patents for a prized process or two, the computer and biotechnology industries are different. New products in these industries are developing at a dizzying pace, and the most valuable assets are ideas, such as software designs or the structure of genetically altered organisms. Every time a software or biotechnology company enters a business deal, intellectual property issues are front and center. The need for intellectual property lawyers has also been fueled by recent changes in patent laws. The scope of what is patentable has expanded in the past two decades, says Meurer, allowing more protection of the fruits of basic research. LAW Professor Robert Bone says that demand is up for courses in the lucrative field of intellectual property law. Photo by Kalman Zabarsky "In the 1980s, Exxon won the right to patent a bacteria that it had genetically altered to ingest oil," he says. "Before then, living organisms couldn't be protected by a patent. More recently, courts have expanded the scope of patents to include computer software, as well as methods of doing digital commerce." The effect of these changes is that there are now more jobs for law students who study intellectual property than ever before. Those with a background in technology or science have the best opportunities, says LAW Professor Robert Bone. About a quarter of the law students who enter LAW's intellectual property program already have an advanced degree or extensive experience in science or engineering, he says. "We have a good track record placing folks with advanced degrees in a hard science in private practices that deal with patents," he says. "The other IP track is for those students more interested in the artistic side of intellectual property, like publishing and entertainment. There isn't as clear a path for those folks, and it's harder for them to get a job in a strictly IP practice." New opportunities Most graduates of LAW who concentrate in intellectual property find jobs at a private practice that handles large numbers of patent cases, and then aim to move on to higher paying corporate jobs, says Elizabeth Armour, director of career planning at the school. Gurvits, who spotted the market niche while at Document Systems, now works for the business office of the Boston law firm of Testa, Hurwitz, and Thibeault. While he doesn't handle intellectual property law cases exclusively, Gurvits says, his concentration in intellectual property makes him effective for all his firm's high-tech clients. "IP comes up in all sorts of things now," he says. "For instance, if a software company is being sold, it has to be decided whether or not any independent consultants it used own any of the rights to codes they helped develop. You might not have to practice only intellectual property law to handle that, but as a lawyer, it helps to be able to spot those issues and know when to bring in an IP expert." Jonathan Minkoff (LAW'00), who decided to become an attorney while managing a rock band after college, wants to pursue a career in intellectual property law so that he can protect the interests of inventors. After using computers to record music, he's confident that he'll be able to overcome the "occasional prejudice" against his nontechnical background and hold his own in the boardroom of any high-tech company. "A lot of people think the idea of being a lawyer for the Rolling Stones is sexy, but what most turns me on about IP is creating the maximum value from intangibles," he says. "You can have something that's worth anywhere from zero to a billion dollars. It's the lawyer's job to make it valuable by exploring ways that the idea is useful." The market for intellectual property lawyers should remain strong for at least the next five to ten years, Bone says. "Students aren't so much attracted by the prospect of big bucks as they are by the promise of this field," he says. "They've grown up playing with the Internet. Technology is a big thing with them, and the opportunity to deal with the legal processes involved in technology is exciting. "And it's a very fast-changing field within law," he says. "The faculty who teach intellectual property constantly have to keep up, because the laws are always changing."