The 2016 Invented Here! Event

event at the Microsoft NERD Center in Cambridge. The event gathered New England leaders in intellectual property, science, and technology to honor New England’s innovators, their innovations, and the stories behind their innovations. The

Invented Here!

program commences each year with New England companies, universities, research institutions, and law firms submitting nominations for inventions patented in the past five years. The

Invented Here!

Selection Committee then undertakes the challenging process of narrowing the nominations down to the featured honorees. This year, the Selection Committee narrowed nineteen honorees down to five featured honorees. The honorees represent many of the diverse fields of science and technology that comprise New England’s innovation community. The inventions of the honorees provide both unique contributions to the honorees’ fields of endeavor and value to society at large. Congratulations to the honorees whose patents, along with lists of inventors, assignees, and nominators, are listed below. The five featured honoree patents are highlighted, with the * denoting the honoree inventor accepting recognition during the evening of the program.

The evening’s celebration began with a cocktail reception, where the honorees and representatives of the honorees, in the presence of poster board displays of the honored patents, discussed the inventions with the attendees. The cocktail reception was followed by a recognition ceremony. During the ceremony, BPLA President

Erik Belt

McCarter & English, LLP

, welcomed the honorees, representatives of the honorees, and other attendees to the event, and Planning Committee co-chair Mark Solomon presented remarks on the Invented Here! program. Selection Committee chair

Dipti Ramnarain

Holland & Knight LLP

, then explained the selection process, which narrowed the nominees to that evening’s top five honorees. Dipti explained that this year’s judging encountered particular difficulty in selecting from all the highly qualified nominees, which resulted in five featured honorees, rather than the three featured honorees in prior years. The 2016 Selection Committee consisted of members of New England colleges, universities, and law firms including:

Dipti proceeded to announce the honorees of the evening. In announcing the honorees, Dipti provided a description of the patented invention of each honoree, as the honoree or representative was presented an award certificate of recognition, and acknowledged those honorees selected as the featured honorees of the evening. Following the ceremony, the featured honorees were asked to participate in a question-and-answer panel moderated by BPLA President Erik Belt and Deirdre Sanders, Hamilton Brook Smith Reynolds. During the panel, the moderators posed questions to the honorees to learn the stories behind their inventions. The posed questions answered by the featured honorees involved how they became inventors, their motivation behind their inventions, challenges that they overcame to achieve their inventions, and the “ah-ha” moment of their inventions. The honorees were then posed questions by the audience, including their reflections on the patent examination process, funding of their inventions, and their interests apart from their fields of endeavor.

The BPLA’s

Invented Here!

Planning Committee is co-chaired by

Mark Solomon

Hamilton Brook Smith Reynolds

;

Rory Pheiffer

Nutter McClennen & Fish LLP

;

Aaron Connor

Eli Lilly and Company

; and

Reza Sadr

Pierce Atwood LLP

Mark Solomon, Invented Here! Committee Co-Chair, presents one of the top honoree awards to Kathleen McMillan.

All of this year’s Invented Here! honorees (or their representatives) stand at the front to receive their well-deserved recognition.

Erik Belt, BPLA President and Deirdre Sanders, BPLA Treasurer, do their best Regis & Kelly routine as they engage top honorees in a discussion about their inventions: Kathleen McMillan, Clive Tucker, Nathan Zink, Olivier D. Boss, and Ye Ding, while Mark Solomon, Invented Here! Committee Co-Chair listens from the podium.

Dipti Ramnarain, Invented Here! Selection Committee Chair, explains to the audience the judging process conducted by members of the BPLA to determine the evening’s top five honorees. Mark Solomon, Invented Here! Committee Co-Chair, and top honorees Kathleen McMillan, Clive Tucker, Nathan Zink, Olivier D. Boss, and Ye Ding look on.

The audience looks during the Invented Here! Program.

Mark Solomon, Invented Here! Committee Co-Chair, explains the history of the Invented Here! program to the audience.

Index

Community Calendar

Table of Contents

President's Message by Erik Belt

BPLA Submitted

Amicus

Brief in Design Case of the Century