Brian Walters

Brian D. Walters serves as Executive Vice-President and General Counsel for Matthews International Corporation, Pittsburgh’s oldest company in continuous operation since 1850 and operating in over 25 countries with over 12,000 employees.  During his 18-year tenure at Matthews, the Company has more than tripled in annual revenue, now producing approximately $1.8 billion in sales.   Brian has directed all legal matters for this publicly-traded corporation both nationally and internationally, as well as serving as a member of Matthews’ executive leadership team.  Mr. Walters has led over 75 domestic and foreign acquisition initiatives at Matthews, including extensive experience coordinating strategies to secure transaction approval from the U.S. Federal Trade Commission, managing HSR filings, as well as filings with the competition authority of the European Union.

Stephen Lee

Stephen Lee is Chief I.P. Counsel at Target and has been with the company for the past 19 years. His practice has covered the entire spectrum of I.P. matters, as he has been responsible for all trademark, copyright and patent work. Particularly rewarding is the fact that his team provides legal services and advice to practically every business team within Target and has touched almost every one of Target’s key strategic initiatives. He manages a team of 24 high-functioning I.P. professionals, and he has first-hand experience leading his team through the ups and downs of the retail landscape transformation.

For the eight years prior to joining Target, Stephen practiced law as a partner at Fish & Richardson and as an associate at Faegre & Benson both in Minneapolis. In private practice, Stephen’s practice was equally diverse as it covered all aspects of I.P.: portfolio maintenance, litigation, contract drafting and negotiation, and strategy and counseling.

Stephen is a proud graduate of the University of Texas where he received both his B.A. and J.D. degrees. Stephen is married and has three children, ages 17, 15 and 6.

Deepak Parashar

Jason Laberteaux

Jason LaBerteaux joined MetLife in 2019 and serves as AVP & Assistant General Counsel with the Global IP/Technology Unit. In his counseling, he primarily focuses on the protection of enterprise intellectual property and on the legal issues related to technology, including outsourcing and the implementation of global platforms. Jason is also responsible for negotiating IT transaction agreements, enabling roll out of the enterprise digital strategy. He also provides intellectual property and information technology legal support to M&A transactions, including due diligence reviews of intellectual property assets and drafting and negotiating transitional services agreements.

Jason is a member of the ACLI Innovation Subcommittee and Federal Quick Reaction Team that focuses on industry regulatory initiatives. Prior to MetLife, Mr. LaBerteaux worked at a number of law firms in the New York area with a focus on software procurement agreements (SaaS, IaaS, outsourcing, and music licensing), IP litigation, Inter Partes Reviews, IP licensing, M&A, and patent prosecution. Jason received his BS in electrical engineering from the University of Louisiana at Lafayette in 2008, and his JD from the University of Connecticut School of Law in 2011.

Jeremiah Chan

John Mulgrew

Paul Liu

Paul is the Global Head of Intellectual Property at TuSimple, a self-driving truck company based out of San Diego, California.  At TuSimple, Paul oversees the intellectual property function with a team of attorneys, patent agents, and paralegals to align the company’s intellectual property with the business to obtain proactive, high impact, and creative protections via patents, trademarks, trade secrets, and copyrights.  He is a subject matter expert for intellectual property assets associated with mechanical engineering, electrical engineering, and computer science technologies.  He has been recognized by leading industry publications such as Intellectual Asset Management (IAM) as one of “The World’s Leading IP Strategists.

Changhae Park

David Shofi

Steven Gong

Kurt Brasch

Patrick Flaherty

Patrick Flaherty is an experienced corporate lawyer with a proven history leading a global IP law and policy group, working with a wide range of business clients, and managing a diverse and inclusive team of legal professionals. Patrick advises Verizon’s business units worldwide on intellectual property and digital media law and policy issues and is charged with managing and protecting Verizon’s intellectual property rights. He received a Bachelor of Corporate Law and LL.B from the National University of Ireland, Galway, and LL.M in intellectual property law from the George Washington University School of Law, and is admitted to practice in the State of New York and is a Solicitor in England and Wales.

Jason Friday

Sivon Kalminov

Mr. Kalminov is the Director of the Canon U.S.A. Inc., Intellectual Property Division.  He is responsible for managing the Division’s day-to-day patent prosecution work, which includes overseeing both the patent prosecution and administration departments.  M. Kalminov also provides support on patent litigation matters, contract matters, and general U.S. patent law related advice to various domestic and international Canon companies and subsidiaries.  Mr. Kalminov is a current member of the California State Bar Intellectual Property Section, and a past Chair, Vice Chair, Secretary, general Executive Committee Member, and Patent Group Chair of the Section.  In addition to his J.D., Mr. Kalminov has a Bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering.