Lauren Ballard

Responsibilities:

Maintain US and foreign patent and trademark portfolio docket; tracking and record updates with internal and various patent office deadlines.

Communicate directly with outside counsel, weekly meetings for patent and trademark filings, prosecution; distributing information and various instructions to and from applicable internal technical groups and executive team.

Provide status and quarterly reports to various departments; updating accounting/finance quarterly projections on fees and IP portfolio growth, preparing patent activity report for review and instructions by IP group leaders, drafting and finalize quarterly inventor incentive bonus awards for payroll, reconciling in-house IP spend.

Conduct IP committee meetings and maintain rolling meeting record; receiving invention disclosures, schedule inventor disclosure meetings, obtaining inventor signatures for formal documents, filing assignments.

Accomplishments:

Establish and manage centralized foreign annuity process, in-house management of US maintenance fees.

Establish and manage trade secret capture and records program.

Establish and manage public notice patent marking process.

Hybrid work arrangement, primary remote 2021-current.

Maintain daily docket processing for portfolio of assigned clients-majority of clients transitioned with attorney group transfer from StoFoCo.

Process incoming patent office communications and client correspondence.

Prepare and coordinate patent documents for attorney group; research, drafting, proofread, form completion and finalize for electronic filing.

Uphold outside counsel guidelines for multiple clients

Supervise legal assistant work load and work product.

Support paralegal group with overflow and project assignments.

Complete billing and time management tasks for client invoice and meet paralegal billable hours requirement.

Legal assistant patent practice support for two principal attorneys and associate attorney of start up IP boutique law firm; docketing, patent and trademark filings and prosecution.

Manage client file relocation from previous law firm.

Create office procedures and operations.

Handle office facilities, supplies, front desk, social activities.

Remote worker with StoFoCo for years 2009-2011.