Microsoft is on a mission to empower every person and every organization on the planet to achieve more. Our culture is centered on embracing a growth mindset, a theme of inspiring excellence, and encouraging teams and leaders to bring their best each day. In doing so, we create life-changing innovations that impact billions of lives around the world. You can help us achieve our mission.

The Patent team in the Intellectual Property Group in Microsoft’s Corporate, External & Legal Affairs (CELA) division has an immediate opening for experienced counsel to help build a world-class patent portfolio, develop business-minded IP strategy, and become a trusted IP advisor. You will engage with technologies that have become the foundation of modern computing as well as those that are now driving the fourth industrial revolution.

Responsibilities

Protecting Innovation: You provide analytical skills and collaborate with an organization on the forefront of web technologies, to harvest inventions, evaluate idea submissions, and make recommendations about how to best protect key innovations for Microsoft. You engage regularly with the inventor community through the inventors themselves, patent champions within the Web Experiences Team (WebXT), and the leadership for the WebXT business. You will also help prosecute the Microsoft patent portfolio by working with Microsoft colleagues and outside counsel in the US as well as internationally to continually improve every aspect of the portfolio that you manage. This includes understanding current patent law as well as identifying trends and anticipating changes to adapt strategy.

IP Advisor: You are the subject matter expert on patents for the business teams in WebXT. You will engage with engineering teams to protect their innovations, advise them on IP strategy, understand their IP concerns, and counsel them accordingly. You also partner with other legal generalists to identify, predict, and navigate IP challenges, including risk mitigation, licensing, competitive analysis, patent policy, and more.

Qualifications

Required/Minimum Qualifications

• Juris Doctorate Degree or Equivalent International Degree OR Completion of a Legal Apprenticeship.
• Active license to practice law in a jurisdiction and capable of meeting admission requirements in relevant jurisdiction.
• 5+ years experience as a practicing attorney OR equivalent practice of law.

Additional or Preferred Qualifications

• 3+ years experience as a Patent attorney 
• Registered as a Patent Attorney at the USPTO
• A technical background in computer engineering, electrical engineering, computer science, computer software, or relevant equivalent is also preferred

Patent Expertise: The ideal candidate has a strong track record of successfully prosecuting patents in a variety of technical fields, but preferably in computer science, computer engineering, and/or electrical engineering. The candidate should have strong patent analysis skills both in terms of patent generation (patentability and claiming strategies) as well as patent evaluation (assessment of patent strength and development of non-infringement and invalidity positions). Ideally, the candidate has experience in both preparation and prosecution of patents as well as patent litigation and counseling.

Communication and Collaboration: The ideal candidate has strong written and verbal communication skills, excellent judgment, and collaborates well with others. To be successful, the candidate should be able to communicate clearly to a range of audiences including business executives, a variety of legal professionals, and externally to business partners and patent office officials. We work in a matrixed environment, and successful candidates will also have a demonstrated track record of communicating across organizations and architecting and driving solutions end to end.

#CELA

Microsoft is an equal opportunity employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to age, ancestry, color, family or medical care leave, gender identity or expression, genetic information, marital status, medical condition, national origin, physical or mental disability, political affiliation, protected veteran status, race, religion, sex (including pregnancy), sexual orientation, or any other characteristic protected by applicable laws, regulations and ordinances.  We also consider qualified applicants regardless of criminal histories, consistent with legal requirements. If you need assistance and/or a reasonable accommodation due to a disability during the application or the recruiting process, please send a request via the Accommodation request form.