Wayne Stacy
Executive Director
Wayne Stacy has been a leading expert on patent law and IP litigation for over two decades. Prior to his appointment as Executive Director of BCLT in May 2021, Wayne was the Director for the USPTO’s Silicon Valley Office. Before that, Wayne spent more than 20 years at several of the world’s top law firms. Most recently, he was a senior partner and Intellectual Property Chair for Baker Botts’ San Francisco office. Prior to that, Wayne was an equity partner in the IP Litigation section of Cooley LLP. During his career, several leading publications—including Chambers, Intellectual Asset Management (IAM), and Super Lawyers—have listed Wayne as one of the country’s top patent litigators. He was also recognized as an “IP Trailblazer” by the National Law Journal. Wayne has served as an adjunct professor at four law schools (including Berkeley) over the last 20 years—teaching patent law, patent litigation, copyright law, and PTAB practice. He has served as an advisor on Federal Court local-rule committees and as faculty for the National Institute for Trial Advocacy.
Mark Cohen
Senior Fellow and Director, BCLT Asia IP Project
Mark Cohen joined Berkeley Law in 2017 as a Senior Fellow and Director of BCLT’s Asia IP Project. With over 30 years’ experience as a law firm attorney, in-house counsel, government official, and adjunct and visiting professor of law, Cohen was previously Senior Counsel and Senior Advisor to the Undersecretary of Commerce/Director of the USPTO. He is widely recognized as the leading expert in the U.S. on intellectual property law in China. As Director of the BCLT Asia IP Project, Cohen is working with BCLT sponsors and faculty directors to develop collaborative relationships with academic institutions and other partners in Asia, including organizing workshops, conferences, and other events that bring data-driven insight to the complex IP landscape in China and other Asian fora. Mark hosts the popular blog www.chinaipr.com, serves as an advisor to the IP database iphouse.cn, and has published books and articles on China’s IP system, antitrust law in China, civil and administrative enforcement of IP, and foreign law firms practicing law in China.
Allison Schmitt
Fellow and Director, BCLT Life Sciences Project
Allison Schmitt JD’15 returns to Berkeley Law to serve as the first Director of the new BCLT Life Sciences Project. She brings tremendous expertise, experience, and energy to this exciting initiative. Upon graduating Allison clerked for the Honorable Stanley R. Chesler at the District of New Jersey, where she worked extensively on ANDA cases. She then clerked for the Honorable Kathleen M. O’Malley at the Federal Circuit, where she further honed her knowledge of bio-pharma law and case management. She then spent several years in private practice focusing on life science patent litigation, patent counseling, and policy matters.
Jann Dudley
Associate Director
As Associate Director at BCLT, Jann is responsible for event management, donor communications and sponsorship, short and long range planning and managing a team of professionals to provide a wide range of programs and events for alumni, law students and the IP community. Jann brings to the table more than 20 years’ award-winning experience in law firm marketing, business development and administration. She has served as marketing director or manager at Orrick, Morgan Lewis, and, most recently, Archer Norris, among other Bay Area law firms. Jann holds a B.A. in Business & Humanities from Golden Gate University.
Richard Fisk
Assistant Director, Events & Communications
Richard joined BCLT in September 2015. Prior to that, he was Special Events Manager for the 2015 San Francisco International Film Festival. From 2011- 2015, Richard was Director of Events at Central European University, a graduate institution in Budapest, Hungary. He has an extensive background in corporate project coordination, which is when he first began organizing large events. At BCLT, Richard is responsible for planning and executing the center’s extensive schedule of conferences, symposiums, forums, and workshops. Richard holds an M.A. in Broadcast and Electronic Communication from San Francisco State.
Matthew Ray
Assistant Director, Program Development & Student Engagement
Matthew has over 5 years of experience working for the University of California, both at Berkeley and Santa Cruz. At BCLT, Matthew enhances law students’ educational experience by managing the Tuesday-Thursday speakers series, coordinating the Law & Technology Certificate, organizing career fair and networking events, advising law and tech-related student groups, and coordinating the mentor program. Matthew also works as a tutor and researcher. Before joining BCLT in 2019, Matthew held positions at The Humanities Institute, CASMA, and the Institute for Jewish Law. Matthew holds a BA in History with a minor in East Asian Studies from UC Santa Cruz.
Nathalie Coletta
Event Planning & Communications Coordinator
Nathalie is a recent graduate from the University of California, Santa Cruz, where she worked for three years as an Event Assistant for the Dickens Project. She graduated in 2020 with a BA in Philosophy along with a minor in Literature and soon after joined the Berkeley Law staff. She works with BCLT as well as Berkeley Judicial Institute and is responsible for helping organize and coordinate various symposia, conferences, and workshops.
Irys Schenker
Office Administrator
Irys joined BCLT as Office Administrator in July 2016, having worked for the previous 3 years in a similar capacity in the Middle Eastern, South Asian and African Studies Department at Columbia University. Before that, she worked in the business and legal affairs units at Lifetime Television Networks and at IFC/Sundance Channel. As Office Administrator, Irys is responsible for all BCLT reimbursements, payments, and procurements. An accomplished artist, Irys holds a BA from San Francisco State University and an MFA from The School of Visual Arts in New York City.
BCLT Fellows
Yuan Hao
Senior Fellow
Dr. Hao Yuan joined BCLT in January 2021 as a Senior Fellow on our Asia IP and Technology Project. Prior to coming to Berkeley, Dr. Hao taught patent law and anti-monopoly law (“AML”) at the School of Law, Tsinghua University (2015-2020). Yuan has published academic papers and articles in the fields of patent law, competition law, data protection and nano-electronics. Her most recent academic paper (En) is “Through the Anti-Monopoly Lens: What Constitutes ‘Unfairly High Patent Pricing’ in China?”. Currently Yuan is working on a practical treatise on Chinese patent law, and a research paper that aims to explore the curious contour and implications of innovation/creation in IP at the coming era of artificial intelligence. Dr. Hao has advised several IP and AML legislation projects in China. She has also participated in a dozen litigation, administrative investigation and arbitration cases, including landmark SEP cases, as an advisory panel member or expert witness. Yuan has been recently listed as an arbitrator at the International Arbitration Center in Tokyo (“IACT”). She is also a Senior Of Counsel at LexField Law. Before becoming academic Yuan practiced years in IP litigation at KWM. Yuan received her J.D. from Brooklyn Law School (2011), Ph.D. in Nano-electronics from Penn State University (2006), and B.S. in Physics from Peking University (1999).
Riccardo Vecellio Segate
Visiting PhD Researcher
Riccardo is the Talent Program PhD Candidate in International Law at the University of Macau. He holds a Master of Laws in Public International Law from Utrecht University, a Postgraduate Diploma in European and Global Governance from the University of Bristol, and three Diplomas in European Affairs, Development Cooperation, and Humanitarian Intervention from ISPI Milan. He also holds a Bachelor (first class) and Master’s Degrees in Piano Performance from the State Conservatory of Verona, and has studied Music in Paris and Salzburg as well. Before joining UC Berkeley Law as a Visiting PhD Researcher in 2022, he has held visiting positions at the University of Leeds (2016), Tsinghua University in Beijing (2019), as well as the University of Hong Kong (2020, deferred). Riccardo has single-authored or second-authored research articles for world-top peer-reviewed law journals and has single-authored research articles for some of the most highly ranked specialized US law reviews, including for the law schools at Columbia (Columbia Journal of Asian Law), UCLA (UCLA Pacific Basin Law Journal), Hastings (Hastings Environmental Law Journal), Loyola Chicago (Loyola University Chicago International Law Review), and North Carolina (North Carolina Journal of International Law and Commercial Regulation). Riccardo has trained at the European Commission as a “Blue Book” stagiaire at the Directorate-General for Communication Networks, Content, and Technology, and worked as a legal consultant in Trade Secrets at Rouse, a tier-one IP firm in Asia.
Kathryn Hashimoto
Copyright Law Fellow
Kathryn Hashimoto received her BA in English from UC Berkeley and her JD from the University of San Francisco School of Law. With a background in book publishing, Kathryn specializes in copyright law. Recent articles with Professor Pamela Samuelson include The Enigma of Digitized Property: A Tribute to John Perry Barlow, Duke Tech. L.J (forthcoming 2019), and Scholarly Concerns About a Proposed Copyright Small Claims Tribunal, 33 Berkeley Tech. L.J. 689 (2018), in addition to forthcoming book chapters on fair use in international copyright contexts and copyright in standards. Kathryn has also worked with Professor Samuelson and the Samuelson Clinic on amicus curiae briefs submitted to the US Supreme Court and the Second and Eleventh Circuit Courts of Appeals.
Robert Barr
BCLT Executive Director Emeritus
Robert Barr was the Executive Director of the Berkeley Center for Law & Technology from 2005 to 2015. Formerly, he was the Vice President for Intellectual Property and Worldwide Patent Counsel for Cisco Systems in San Jose, California, where he was responsible for all patent prosecution, licensing, and litigation. Robert has degrees in Electrical Engineering and Political Science from MIT and a JD from Boston University School of Law. He is a frequent speaker on patent reform and has testified twice at the Federal Trade Commission hearings on Competition and Intellectual Property Law and Policy in the Knowledge-Based Economy. He was named by the Daily Journal as one of the top 25 Intellectual Property Lawyers in California in 2003, and as one of the top 10 in-house intellectual property lawyers in 2004.
Ramya Chandrasekhar
Biometric Regulatory Fellow
Ramya Chandrasekhar is a research fellow at BCLT and leads the Biometrics Project. This project aims to study legal and institutional regulation of biometric data, from a critical and comparative perspective. Prior to joining BCLT, Ramya worked with the Legal and Innovation team at the World Bank as an International Finance and Development Fellow, on personal data protection enforcement involving digital platforms. She has also collaborated with the Information Communication and Technology team at UNICEF as well as Guarini Global Law & Tech, on projects relating to digital risk and data governance within international organizations. Ramya is a lawyer by training and is qualified to practice at the bar in India. She holds a Master of Law from New York University, and a Bachelor of Law from the West Bengal National University of Juridical Sciences. She also has over 4 years of experience working with law firms, civil society, and academic research centers on a range of issues at the intersection of law and technology, including digital ID and the digital welfare state, surveillance, information privacy, and Fintech regulation. Ramya’s research interests lie in global data law, critical data studies and science and technology studies.