President Donald Trump has nominated Andrei Iancu as director of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO).
Iancu will be Under Secretary of Commerce for Intellectual Property.
He is currently the managing parter of law firm Irell & Manella LLP and a member of the litigation and property practice groupy, including practicing before the USPTO. He also teaches patent law at UCLA.
Related: Groups Want USPTO Exempted from Trump Hiring Freeze
Iancu is familiar to followers of Tivo's various patent and patent infringement suits. He represented the company's DVR technology in cases involving AT&T, Motorola, Verizon and EchoStar.
Michelle Lee, who had headed the USPTO since 2015, resigned in June. She had been the first woman to head the office.
"We congratulate Mr. Iancu on his nomination to be Director of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office," said Brian Pomper, executive director of the Innovation Alliance. "A nationally recognized and respected intellectual property law expert, Mr. Iancu has served clients across the technical spectrum. We believe that he will be able to balance the views of independent inventors, entrepreneurs, and various industry groups—all those that form our U.S. innovation ecosystem.”
“We join other innovation policy stakeholders in hoping the Senate will promptly consider his nomination. We look forward to working with Mr. Iancu in creating a strong, stable, and balanced U.S. intellectual property landscape for entities of all sizes.”
