FB Rice July 2019 Promotions
FB Rice have had another busy financial year, providing a full suite of IP service strategy offerings to our clients at home and abroad. With a dedicated team that specialise across a broad range of industries and technologies, we can respond to our clients IP needs with the right technical expert every time. We recruit the best people at the top of their game, and have committed to developing their careers with FB Rice.
The partners of FB Rice are excited to announce the promotion to Associate of three of the firm’s talented patent attorneys based in Melbourne. These include Brittany Howard (Chemistry), David Herman (Chemistry) and Karl Solanthi (Engineering).
Brittany Howard entered the profession in January 2014 after having undertaken a Postdoctoral Fellowship at the National Institute of Health (Bethesda) in the United States. Prior to this, Brittany completed her PhD in Medicinal Chemistry at the Monash Institute of Pharmaceutical Sciences (MIPS). Since joining FB Rice in November 2015, Brittany has established a diverse practice, including work for both local and international clients. Brittany’s working highlights include the successful opposition and revocation of patents critical to her clients’ commercial freedom to operate, as well as undertaking extensive freedom to operate and patentability opinions. Brittany most enjoys the drafting and prosecution of patent specifications in the medicinal chemistry area for her local clients.
David Herman joined the firm in January 2015 after completing a PhD in Chemistry (Nanomaterials), Bachelor of Science in Chemistry (Honours) and a Bachelor of Biomedical Science (Molecular Pharmacology and Medicinal Chemistry), and offers strong credibility across the fields of chemistry, biotechnology and nanotechnology. David has worked on over ten patent oppositions in Australia and New Zealand, including the first substantive opposition in Australia to deal with lack of “best method” under the new Raising the Bar amendment provisions.
Karl Solanthi joined the firm in March 2014, after working as a researcher for the Laboratory for Turbulence Research in Aerospace and Combustion at Monash University, the Weather Energy Research Unit at CSIRO, the Institut de Mécanique des Fluides de Toulouse, and the Cosmic Ray Group at Kyoto University on scholarship from the Global Centres of Excellence. Karl has been proud to work on a number of interesting technological developments for a well-known electronics company and was recently successful in arguing for Certification of a Registered Design at hearing.
We congratulate our newly promoted staff, along with all our attorneys and support staff who have made such a large contribution across the firm and make our firm such a great place to work.