Avoiding Surprises in Licensing

Before you can grow a great company from someone else’s patented idea, you need the right to use it. Licensing is a wonderful tool for bringing in new technologies and capturing value from your own IP, but can lead to misunderstandings, pitfalls, and surprises if not done well. Come hear two early-stage companies and an all-star veteran panel tell their stories of success and things that they (or their stakeholders) wish they did differently. We'll also celebrate our new location and relationship with the Montgomery County Campus of Johns Hopkins University.

Presenting Companies

William “Bill” Enright is President and CEO of Vaxin, a non-invasive vaccine solutions company. Prior to joining Vaxin, Bill spent six years with GenVec, Inc. with increasing responsibilities including the Head of Business Development. He was responsible for helping to build GenVec’s vaccine business including approximately $140M of funding for vaccine related initiatives and moving four vaccines into clinical development, and has over 20 years of experience in a variety of positions within the life science/biotech industry.

Donald Faulkner is CTO of both Smart Perfusion LLC, and a related technology licensing firm, BioMedInnovation LLC (BMI). Smart Perfusion’s VasoWaveTM technology extends the life of transplantable organs. BMI’s focus areas include early stage medical device development for donor organ assessment, organ transportation, pulsed perfusion assistance for extra corporeal membrane oxygenator, cardiopulmonary bypass, and other types of specialized fluid delivery or pressure regulation systems. Mr. Faulkner has over thirty years of experience in the development and commercialization of proprietary and patent protected intellectual property for the industrial and medical markets.

Panelists

Steve Ferguson currently serves as Deputy Director and senior licensing professional for the NIH Office of Technology Transfer, the patent & licensing office for technologies arising from the NIH and FDA research programs. A registered Patent Agent and a Certified Licensing Professional (CLP), Mr. Ferguson is the licensing instructor for both the USDA Graduate School and four NIH Foundation for Advanced Education in the Sciences (FAES) Graduate School courses on Technology Transfer and Biomedical Business Development, where he also serves as Department Chair.

Robert Rosenbaum is President and Executive Director of the Maryland Technology Development Corporation (TEDCO). TEDCO supports early-stage companies with technology transfer, commercialization training and seed funding. Prior to joining TEDCO, Rob was Managing Director of Nobska Ventures, an early stage venture capital fund focused on technology and medical devices, and has 30 years of experience leading high performance teams and organizations.”

Henry Wixon As Chief Counsel for NIST, Mr. Henry Wixon provides intellectual property counsel and representation as well as legal guidance, representation and management assistance to NIST’s 3,000-employees. In this role, the NIST Counsel interacts with principal developers and users of research, including private and public laboratories, universities, corporations and governments. Prior to joining NIST, Mr. Wixon was a partner in the Intellectual Property practice at WilmerHale. A registered patent attorney and Certified Licensing Professional, Mr. Wixon worked often with pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies while in private practice.