Kevin S. Ross
About Kevin
Kevin Ross is an experienced patent prosecutor with broad experience in all types of intellectual property. Start-up companies regularly seek Kevin’s seasoned counsel in protecting their core IP, while larger companies leverage Kevin’s international experience to help develop and manage worldwide patent portfolios. Kevin has helped clients secure patents in the U.S., Canada, Europe, India, China, Japan, Korea, Russia, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Macau, Australia, and New Zealand. His international patent experience also includes living abroad—helping Italian companies obtain U.S. patents while also learning procedures and practice of the European Patent Office.
With regard to U.S. intellectual property matters, Kevin is skilled in all phases of patent prosecution, including invention harvesting, drafting patents on time and on budget, appeals, inter partes and ex partes re-examination, reissue, and post-grant opposition. He has led several patent due diligence investigations and has drafted numerous freedom to operate, validity, invalidity, infringement, and non-infringement opinions.
Before entering the field of intellectual property law, Kevin was a computer application programmer for a Fortune-50 company where he designed and coded management information tools deployed in over 26 regional offices across the U.S. His graduate school education in electrical engineering was primarily focused on circuit design as well as semiconductor physics and methods of semiconductor fabrication. Since beginning patent practice in 1996, Kevin has gained significant experience in several technologies, including dynamic, static, and non-volatile RAM, video compression, accelerometers, medical devices, computer software, camera lenses, organic LEDs, solar cells, parallel computer processing, power supplies, reconfigurable computing, audio noise cancellation, analog-to-digital converters, oscilloscopes, logic analyzers, and pressurized beer growlers, among others.
In addition to his experience at Miller Nash, Kevin has worked in medium-sized and large IP boutique firms, an international boutique, and in-house as a director of intellectual property.
Representative Experience
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Patents Plus
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Prepared freedom to operate patent opinion to support entry of new business line in excess of $20 million.
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Assisted with successful appeals on behalf of clients at the Patent Trial and Appeal Board.
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Handled successful inter partes patent re-examination resulting in loss of patent rights for client competitor.
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Provided strategic counseling on designing around patented technology.
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Prepared IP budgets for small and emerging companies.
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Largely expanded a client’s patent portfolio that was a significant factor in a $400+ million acquisition.
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Serve as patent counsel to general counsel for companies having no in-house patent counsel.
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Significantly reduced the scope of competitor’s pending patent applications by submitting targeted reference to the managing patent examiner, anonymously or non-anonymously, depending on the client’s strategy.
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Activities
- Oregon Patent Law Association (OPLA)
- Board Member, 2021-2023
- Oregon State Bar IP Section
- Board Member, 2018-2021
- TechAmerica (formerly TechOregon), Member, 2004-2014
- Technology and Intellectual Committee, Chair, 2011
Recognition
- Selected for inclusion in The Best Lawyers in America® (Portland, OR)
- Patent Law, 2024-present; “Lawyer of the Year,” 2025
- Trademark Law, 2020-present
- Recognized as a “Patent star” by Managing Intellectual Property IP STARS, 2014-present
- Recognized as a “Notable Practitioner” by Chambers USA in Intellectual Property, 2020
Outside the Office
In his off hours, Kevin plays soccer in leagues suited for his age, messes about in sailboats, and produces a small amount of commercial wine in a family winery.