About Us
Gary Williams, IP Attorney
A nationally recognized IP attorney with big-law experience, Gary embeds seamlessly with executives and legal teams to strengthen IP strategy, protect innovation and become your IP force multiplier.
Our Services
Fractional IP Counsel
Experienced IP leadership embedded with your legal team, delivering strategic guidance without full-time overhead.
Patent Prosecution
End-to-end patent prosecution focused on quality, consistency, and building defensible, business-aligned IP portfolios.
Training
Practical, hands-on training of your IP attorneys that elevates patent drafting, prosecution judgment, and real-world IP decision-making.
Why Choose Us
His clients rely on him not just for legal protection, but for strategic guidance: helping them strengthen their IP portfolios, leverage innovation across the business, and make smarter decisions about patents, trademarks, trade secrets, and long-term asset value. By adding Gary to their team as a fractional IP counsel, companies gain a sophisticated, trusted IP attorney to assist their team.
Engaging with You
Embedded
I work alongside your in-house legal team or executives for faster, better IP decisions.
Collaborative
Highly collaborative partner who strengthens strategy through clear communication and shared problem-solving.
Fractional
Flexible engagement model—use precisely the expertise and time you need, when you need it.
Gary S. Williams
IP Attorney
Gary S. Williams
Intellectual Property Attorney & Fractional IP Counsel
I am a nationally recognized intellectual property attorney and fractional IP counsel with more than 30 years of experience advising technology companies on patent prosecution, IP strategy, and global portfolio management. My practice focuses on helping in-house legal teams protect innovation, manage risk, and align intellectual property with business objectives. I bring deep technical expertise across electronics, computer architecture, software, human-computer interaction, digital signal processing, and integrated circuit memory design, informed by my early career as a hardware and software design engineer at Signetics and Zilog.
I have advised a broad range of clients, including leading research universities such as Stanford and UC Berkeley, as well as Fortune 100 and global technology companies including Google, Apple, and Deere & Company. I also work with mid-sized and emerging technology companies as they scale. My experience spans all aspects of patent prosecution and IP portfolio strategy, including portfolio development and optimization, licensing support, pre-litigation patent analysis, reexaminations, reissue proceedings and foreign patent prosecution.
Before launching my fractional IP counsel practice, I spent more than two decades as a partner at Morgan, Lewis & Bockius LLP, where I served as the lead Silicon Valley attorney for electronics and software patent prosecution. I previously practiced as a partner at Pennie & Edmonds LLP and at Flehr, Hohbach, Test, Albritton & Herbert LLP, where I also served nine years as managing partner. Over the course of my career, I have authored and prosecuted thousands of U.S. and international patent applications and overseen large, complex global patent portfolios, including extensive filings across Asia and Europe. I have also managed substantial trademark portfolios and advised on global branding strategy.
A core part of my practice is working closely with in-house legal teams as an embedded, collaborative partner. I regularly support general counsel and IP leaders by augmenting internal capabilities, managing outside counsel, and providing practical, business-focused IP guidance. I am also deeply committed to training and mentoring IP professionals, having personally trained more than 100 attorneys and patent agents in patent drafting, prosecution strategy, and effective portfolio management.
My work in patent prosecution and IP strategy has been consistently recognized by leading legal and industry publications. I am ranked in Chambers USA for Intellectual Property: Patent Prosecution (2022–2025), recommended by The Legal 500 US in Patents (2020, 2021, 2023–2025), and named an Elite Patent Practitioner by IAM Global Leaders (2019, 2022, 2024, 2025). I have also been repeatedly recognized in the IAM Patent 1000: The World’s Leading Patent Professionals (2017–2025). Teams I have led have twice been honored as Law360 Practice Group of the Year in Intellectual Property (2019, 2024).
I earned my J.D. from Harvard Law School and graduated summa cum laude from Yale University with a B.S. in Physics, and Engineering, and Applied Science. I am admitted
to practice in California and before the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. I am based in Palo Alto, California.
Technologies in which I have experience:
- Memory – memory system architecture, cache systems, memory cell structures (DRAM, Flash, etc.) and associated semiconductor manufacturing methodologies, memory chip and memory controller interfaces, embedded error correction, etc. I designed memory circuitry before law school.
- Software – I’ve worked on patent applications on so many types of software, they are too numerous to list.
- AI – Models, training methodologies, system architectures, edge hardware and computation, high bandwidth memory systems, applications.
- Quantum computing technology – support circuitry and system architectures for quantum computing, including superconducting elements and circuitry
- SOC – System on Chip architecture, processor design, interface design, etc.
- Digital signal processing – satellite signal receivers, audio and video signal processing, error correction/management
- Audio – sensors, output devices, spatial audio, etc.
- User interfaces – I’m a leading expert on patent protection for the distinctive ways products/services interact with users.