Lars is a patent attorney who currently chairs the MVS Design Patent Practice Group. He is keenly interested in innovation, design, and the stories of people who feel compelled to make their ideas into reality. Lars’ daily practice is predominantly focused on procuring, licensing, and enforcing Intellectual Property for such innovations and designs, both in the United States and abroad. During his time with MVS, Lars’ peers have recognized him as having developed significant expertise in navigating the complex and esoteric legal rules and regulations of the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) and those governed by International Intellectual Property Treaties.
Lars joined MVS after obtaining a Bachelor of Aerospace Engineering & Mechanics from the University of Minnesota (’13) and a J.D. from the Mitchell Hamline School of Law (’17). While completing his law degree, Lars was awarded Mitchell Hamline’s Patent Law Certificate; served as a Notes & Comments Editor for Cybaris®, an Intellectual Property Law Review; conducted research for Professor R. Carl Moy; was elected Vice President of Mitchell Hamline’s Student Intellectual Property Law Association; and prosecuted patent applications as a certified Student Attorney through Mitchell Hamline’s Intellectual Property Law Clinic. Lars also gained valuable experience at the USPTO drafting Office actions as a Summer Extern in USPTO Art Unit 2837, which relates to musical technologies and inductors.
Lars is driven to help people. He recognizes that many of his successes are due in large part to the gracious support of many mentors and friends. As a result, Lars is now happy to pay those kindnesses forward to his many clients and mentees. Building a strong community and assisting those in need of Lars’s expertise is not only his responsibility, but an honor. In his spare time, Lars enjoys powerlifting, playing strategic games, and travelling to foreign countries with his family.
Iowa Engineering Society, 2024–Present
LegalCORPS: Inventor Assistance Program, 2019–Present
Iowa State Bar Association, 2019–Present
Association of University Technology Managers (AUTM), 2017-Present
Iowa Intellectual Property Law Association, 2017–Present
Vice President, 2025
Secretary, 2024
Board Member, 2021-2023
Minnesota Intellectual Property Law Association, 2016–2017, 2023-Present
American Intellectual Property Law Association, 2017-Present
American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Lifetime Member
AIAA Iowa Chapter Vice Chair, 2024-Present
AIAA Iowa Chapter Secretary, 2021-2024
Mitchell Hamline School of Law, J.D., magna cum laude, Certificate in Patent Law, 2017
University of Minnesota, B.S., Aerospace Engineering & Mechanics, Minors in Economic Theory and Astrophysics, 2013
Panelist: Association of University Technology Managers (AUTM) Annual Meeting, March 2025; National Harbor, Maryland
Technology Transfer and Intellectual Property in Digital Agriculture: Meeting the Demands of Future Food Needs
Workshop Leader: University Economic Development Association (UEDA), October 2024; South Bend, IA
Strategic Considerations for Design Patents in University IP Portfolios
Presenter: LawPracticeCLE, July 2024
Protecting Inventions for Industrial Designs Under the Hague Agreement
Featured Guest: Iowa Manufacturing Podcast, April 2024; Des Moines, Iowa
MVS Patent Attorneys Celebrate 100 Years Protecting Rights
Panelist: LEGUS International, May 2023
Young Lawyers Roundtable: Efficiencies, Fixed Fees, & Automation
Series Panelist: American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics; Lincoln, Nebraska and Ames, Iowa
Transitioning From School to the Work Force, Hosted by University of Nebraska (October 2022) and Iowa State University (February 2022)
Presenter: LawPracticeCLE, August 2022
Game Changing Innovations in the Virtual World
Presenter: MyLawCLE & the Federal Bar Association, February 2022
Patents in The Virtual World: Seeking Gaming Patents, Licensing, and Other Legal Issues that Plague Gaming Providers, Small and Large
Keynote Speaker: Soft & Patent 2019; Minsk, Belarus
Practical Cases of Software Patent Protection and Litigation
Presenter: 2019 eCommerce & Intellectual Property Law Seminar; Des Moines, Iowa
Strategic Considerations for Design Patents in Your IP Portfolio
Contributing Editor: NaGrunciePrawa, 2019; Warsaw, Poland
See, e.g., Comparing United States and European Patent Law for Software
U.S. Pat. No. D875,237 “Breathing Device”
U.S. Pat. No. D905,136 “Hammermill Hammer”
U.S. Pat. No. D915,878 “Foldable Packaging with Surface Ornamentation”
U.S. Pat. No. D924,668 “Screw Anchor”
U.S. Pat No. D974,517 “Slide Stop”
U.S. Pat. No. 10,351,050 “Emergency or Work Related Light Bar”
U.S. Pat. No. 10,619,323 “Adjustable Foundation Support System”
U.S. Pat. No. 11,034,422 “Elliptical Powered Watercraft”
U.S. Pat. No. 11,195,010 “Smoke Detection System and Method”
U.S. Pat. No. 11,652,539 “Architecture and Orchestrator of a Communications Subsystem for a Space Based Satellite”
Int’l Pub. No. WO 2019/178375 “Mountable Furrow Closing Assembly”
Int’l Pub. No. WO 2019/204696 “Dispensing a Solid Chemistry Using an Adjustable Turbulent Flow Technology Manifold”
Int’l Pub. No. WO 2020/081111 “Mechanism Combining Articulation and Side-Shift”
Int’l Pub. No. WO 2020/132667 “Device to Couple Members of a Heavy-Duty Machine”
Int’l Pub. No. WO 2021/091812 “Burner Tube”
Int’l Pub. No. WO 2022/170261 “UV-Light Drawing Activity”
Int’l Pub. No. WO 2023/283640 “Reversible Electroadhesion of Hydrogels to Animal Tissues for Sutureless Repair of Cuts or Tears”
Int’l Pub. No. WO 2023/197233 “Chemo-Mechanical Solution for Cleaning Fluidic Tanks and Piping”
Iowa, 2018
Minnesota, 2017
United States Patent & Trademark Office, 2014
Mitchell Hamline Merit Scholarship, 2014–2017
MIPLA Cup Finalist/Scholarship Winner, 2017
CALI Award (Patent Prosecution), 2016
USPTO Patent Pro Bono Achievement Certificate, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023 (heightened recognition)
American Intellectual Property Law Association (AIPLA) Pro Bono Award, 2023
On December 13, 2024, the European Patent Office President António Campinos welcomed a delegation from Costa Rica, led by the Minister of Justice and Peace Gerald Campos Valverde, for the signing of a landmark validation agreement. Costa Rica is the seventh country to sign a validation agreement with the EPO, following Morocco, Moldova, Tunisia, Cambodia, […]
Read Post →The USPTO has concluded seeking comments from the public on negotiations at the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) regarding a proposed Design Law Treaty (DLT). A diplomatic conference to finalize the treaty will soon be conducted in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, November 11-22, 2024. The comments were intended to inform U.S. government participation in the diplomatic […]
Read Post →The long-standing Rosen-Durling test used to assess nonobviousness of design patents required a primary reference must be “basically the same” as the challenged design claim, and further that any secondary references must be “so related”. The Federal Circuit had never considered the merits of the Rosen-Durling test. Hearing LKQ Corp. v. GM Glob. Tech. Operations […]
Read Post →Our esteemed colleagues at Daniel IP report to us that there are exciting new rules that have come into effect for designs in Brazil. They authored the following summary of the new laws. We believe this summary will be extremely useful to many U.S. Applicants considering protection in Brazil in the design space. We highly […]
Read Post →The USPTO has disabled the widely beloved First Office Action Estimator. The First Office Action Estimator was available to the public. It allowed many of our clients to check the status of their application without needing to communicate with us. The USPTO’s stated reasons for the disabling of the Estimator follow. “In fiscal year 2021, […]
Read Post →A petition is a request for the USPTO to take certain action in your patent or patent application. They are aimed to allow the Applicant a mechanism to request third party review of almost all procedural matters before the USPTO that are not the subject of Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB). The Office of Petitions (OPET) […]
Read Post →Title 17 of the U.S. Code concerns copyright laws. Chapter 9 of Title 17 is entirely dedicated to the protection of Mask Works. 17 U.S.C. § 901 defines a mask work as “a series of related images, however fixed or encoded, having or representing the predetermined, three-dimensional pattern of metallic, insulating, or semiconductor material present […]
Read Post →A diplomatic conference was held in 1989 in Washington, D.C. The diplomats in attendance were representatives of member states of the United Nations (UN) World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) or representatives of intergovernmental organizations meeting certain criteria. The diplomats were there to consider whether their Member nations were interested in offering additional protections for integrated […]
Read Post →Did you know that layout designs (topographies) of integrated circuits are a separate field in the protection of Intellectual Property (“IP”)? Most Americans understand IP to be classified within one of patents, trademarks, copyrights, and trade secrets, yet this is not always how all countries choose to classify all IP rights. Another form of protection […]
Read Post →The National Science Foundation’s new Accelerating Research Translation (ART) program is a game-changer for universities in the United States. The $60 million program will provide up to $6 million per award over four years to academic institutions to build capacity and infrastructure needed to strengthen and scale the translation of basic research outcomes into impactful […]
Read Post →NFTs represent unique and individualized digital identifiers that cannot be copied, substituted, or subdivided, unlike cryptocurrencies. Both technologies are built and reside on blockchain technology. Both NFTs and cryptocurrencies have a complicated relationship with the patent, trademark, and copyright systems. For example, U.S. copyright laws do not automatically give an NFT owner any rights in […]
Read Post →As of Saturday, December 3, 2022, trademark applicants will have three months (with a possible three-month extension) to respond to an Office action issued during the examination of a trademark application at the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) instead of the current six months. A similar timeline for responding is already employed by […]
Read Post →On September 30, the United States Patent and Trademark Office’s (USPTO) new Patent Public Search tool (PPUBS) replaced four legacy tools—Public-Examiner’s Automated Search Tool (PubEAST), Public-Web-based Examiner’s Search Tool (PubWEST), Patent Full-Text and Image Database (PatFT), and Patent Application Full-Text and Image Database (AppFT). Patent Public Search provides more convenient, remote, and robust full-text searching of all […]
Read Post →A common question I am commonly asked is: How long will it take for me to get a patent? The answer is it depends. There are a few factors. Some art units are faster to examine patent applications than others. Some Examiners issue more communications, known as Office actions, than others. If an Examiner mails […]
Read Post →Yesterday, March 29, 2022, the USPTO published a notice on the Federal Register, announcing it is making it easier to participate in the Expanded Collaborative Search Pilot (CSP) program. Specifically, the USPTO collaborated with its counterpart offices, the Japan Patent Office (JPO) and the Korea Intellectual Property Office (KIPO), to develop a combined petition form […]
Read Post →We often get asked: Just how exactly does one prevail at trial in a copyright litigation? To what degree of likeness do songs have to have in order to be considered a copy? Forensic musicology is the means by which parties can offer evidence in copyright disputes. Forensic musicologists analyze melody, harmony, rhythm, and orchestration […]
Read Post →They say in patents the name of the game is the claims. So, can you guess which game this claim likely belongs to? A game controlling method comprising: based on input to a controller, digging in a terrain object disposed in a virtual space, placing an object representing a flowable fluid in a dug portion […]
Read Post →The race for the most gold medals during the 2020 Summer Olympics (informally “Tokyo 2020” and more formally “the Games of the XXXII Olympiad”) has now come to a close, and what a spectacle it was! Individuals, news outlets, and official Olympic sponsors are generally free to post and tweet about the games and athletes […]
Read Post →The Ravn X (Aevum) unmanned aircraft will be used to both deliver cargo and launch rockets, pending approval from the Federal Aviation Administration. For its intellectual efforts in this space, the company was awarded U.S. Patent No. 10,994,842. The heart of the invention concerns a payload delivery system for an aircraft. Aevum is the first […]
Read Post →Pegasus Universal Aerospace (Pegasus UA) has recently acquired a U.S. patent for a newly developed vertical takeoff and landing business jet. The patent, U.S. Patent No. 10,710,713, names Dr. Mohamed Reza Mia as its sole inventor. Dr. Reza Mia also serves as Pegasus UA’s founder and chairman. The Johannesburg-based South Africa company seemingly hopes to […]
Read Post →Seat 9 of the Federal Circuit is being vacated by Judge Evan Wallach, who was appointed by President Barack Obama and will take senior status. President Joe Biden will thus be tasked with nominating the seat’s next holder. The seat will be officially vacated on May 31, 2021. The last seat to open up on […]
Read Post →A utility model is a patent-like intellectual property right to protect inventions. American, Canadian, and British inventors and companies are often unaware that such rights exist, given that their laws do not allow for registration of these rights. Utility models are generally cheaper to obtain and maintain, have a shorter term (generally 6 to 15 […]
Read Post →Patent Analytics Provider Juristat blogged on May 28, 2020 that Juristat is capable of tracking procrastination habits of examiners at the USPTO. To better understand how examiners procrastinate and why some would choose to or choose to avoid doing so requires some background knowledge of how examiners are internally evaluated by the USPTO. Examiner performance is evaluated […]
Read Post →28 U.S.C 1498 allows the government to use or authorize others to use any invention “described in and covered by a patent of the United States.” If such authorization is granted, patent owners can sue the United States, but only for reasonable compensation. Patent owners are not able to seek injunctions against private entities working […]
Read Post →There are now at least nine pending trademark applications incorporating “OK Boomer.” The applicants notably include Fox Media, who wishes to use the mark for a television series. It appears the applicants are unlikely to receive rights in the mark because the memed-to-death slogan conveys ordinary or familiar concepts or sentiments, as well as social, […]
Read Post →National Public Radio (NPR) reports T-Mobile has sent a cease and desist letter to startup Lemonade. For those unfamiliar with Lemonade, Lemonade is a public benefit corporation quickly growing in popularity, particularly with millennials, because the company donates all unclaimed money to charities of the policyholder’s choice. T-Mobile asserts Lemonade’s use of a color allegedly similar […]
Read Post →Intellectual property is a category of property that includes intangible creations of the human intellect. It is widely accepted patents, copyrights, and trademarks confer an exclusive right. Unlike patents and copyrights, the constitutional foundation for trademark law is the Commerce Clause, U.S. Const., Art. I, § 8, cl. 3, rather than the Intellectual Property Clause, […]
Read Post →It is widely accepted patents and copyrights confer a Constitutional exclusive right. See the Intellectual Property Clause, U.S. Const., Art. I. § 8, cl. 8. Unlike patents and copyrights, the constitutional foundation for trademarks is the Commerce Clause, U.S. Const., Art. I, § 8, cl. 3. Thus, the trademark right may conceivably be a property right, while patents and […]
Read Post →From July 28 – July 31, 2019, I had the pleasure of attending the Association of Technology Managers (AUTM) 2019 Central Region Meeting. AUTM is a nonprofit organization dedicated to bringing research to life by supporting and enhancing the global, academic technology transfer profession through education, professional development, partnering and advocacy. AUTM’s attendance has been […]
Read Post →Software Eligibility in Europe Programs for computers are partially, albeit explicitly, excluded from patentability under Article 52(2) of the European Patent Convention (EPC). Article 52(3) EPC elaborates, “The provisions of paragraph 2 shall exclude patentability of the subject-matter or activities referred to in that provision only to the extent to which a European patent application […]
Read Post →Typically, patent attorneys are privileged to work side by side with examiners who embrace the collaborative relationship that exists between patent applicants and the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO). It is typical for examiners and patent attorneys to initially disagree on legal and/or technical issues which relate to the claims of a patent […]
Read Post →On April 15, 2019, I had the pleasure of attending the Invent Iowa 2019 Competition. Invent Iowa is hosted annually by the Belin-Blank Center of the University of Iowa’s College of Education. Invent Iowa is a competition which allows students K-8 to pitch a three-minute presentation about their inventions to volunteer judges and other students, […]
Read Post →As you are most likely aware, the United States government was shutdown for a total of 35 days, the longest shutdown in US history. The shutdown led to 380,000 federal workers being furloughed, and an additional 420,000 workers were required to work without any known payment dates during this period, forcing many to find other […]
Read Post →In December 2018, the United States Patent & Trademark Office (USPTO) reported it would stay open at least for a temporary time in the event of a government shutdown. Thus far, the USPTO closed only on December 24, 2018 (Christmas Eve), as a result of an executive order issued by President Trump. Christmas Eve fell […]
Read Post →SZ DJI Technology Co. could lose access to the U.S. market in a patent-infringement lawsuit with Autel Robotics Co. where Autel asserts SZ DJI infringes U.S. Patent Nos.7,979,174 and 9,260,184, which cover rotor attachment and speed changes, and SZ DJI asserts Autel infringes at least U.S. Patent Nos.9,016,617; 9,284,049; 9,321,530; D691,514;9,284,040 and 9,592,744, which cover […]
Read Post →Ameranth Inc. asserts it is a leading provider of wireless and Internet based solutions for the hospitality/gaming markets and that it has a very strong intellectual property portfolio including numerous strategic patents in technologies such as Wireless POS, Table Management, Reservations Management, Mobile Concierge, Electronic Menus, Guest Surveys, Inventory Management, Health Care Services and Enrollment […]
Read Post →The AIAA chose to honor Paul M. Bevilaqua by presenting him with the 2017 Daniel Guggenheim Medal. The Daniel Guggenheim Medal was established in 1929 for the purpose of honoring persons who make notable achievements in the advancement of aeronautics. The Medal is jointly sponsored by AIAA, ASME, SAE, and AHS. The medal is considered […]
Read Post →In May, an eight-member California federal jury awarded Apple a staggering $500+ million verdict as a result of a patent litigation lawsuit that has been ongoing for at least 7 years. The verdict has proved to be particularly puzzling for patent law professors and other patent advocates that disagree over whether an article of manufacture in relation […]
Read Post →A recent Webinar moderated by Gene Quinn of IPWatchdog.com titled, “Strategic Use of Design Patents”, analogized a design patent to a tool in a tool box. This analogy is intriguing. For example, a utility patent could be considered a hammer, as it is useful in a wide array of applications and delivers a devastating impact […]
Read Post →Michael Sheetz of CNBC reports “Japan is offering $940 million to fund space start-ups in a new push to grow the industry, the government announced Tuesday at an event in Tokyo” and that “funds will be made available through investments and loans over the next five years, as part of a government-led initiative to double […]
Read Post →The technology of U.S. Patent No. 9,921,579, which issued on March 20, 2018, may help Amazon grapple with how flying robots might interact with human bystanders and customers waiting on their doorsteps. Apple engineer Frederik Schaffalitzky (formerly an engineer for Amazon) is the sole inventor responsible for these recent technological innovations. While, the parent patent […]
Read Post →Howard S. Jones, Jr. has been posthumously honored as a 2018 inductee into the National Inventors Hall of Fame for his innovative work in developing conformal antennas. This invention has been crucial for the development of enhanced capabilities for spacecraft, rockets and other aeronautical technologies. March 1, 2018 marked the 41st anniversary of the issuance of U.S. […]
Read Post →Daniel Wilson of Law360.com reports on Friday, February 2nd, U.S. District Judge Raymound A. Jackson “trimmed two claims from space technology company SSL’s suit accusing rival Orbital ATK of stealing its trade secrets through a shared NASA server, but refused to toss the suit, saying SSL had adequately pled the majority of its allegations.” SSL […]
Read Post →On January 16, 2018, Lawrence Garrett reported The American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) chose to honor Senior Member Dr. Jay Gundlach in the AIAA Momentum Member Spotlight for January 2018. With respect to Dr. Gundlach’s intellectual property endeavors, Lawrence notes: For the past two decades, Dr. Jay Gundlach has been a pioneering force behind […]
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