Miller Canfield Expands IP, Life Sciences and Biotechnology Practices
The law firm of Miller Canfield announces that Mr. Thomas A. Wootton, senior counsel, and Mr. Kelly T. Murphy, associate, have joined the firm in the Intellectual Property and Life Sciences and Biotechnology groups in the Kalamazoo office.
“People are demanding more industry-specific legal counsel. They want to work with lawyers who speak the same language. Tom and Kelly bring a wealth of experience as lawyers and former research scientists,” said Harold Decker, attorney and leader of Miller Canfield’s Intellectual Property and Life Sciences and Biotechnology groups. Nearly one-third of the firm’s attorneys in these groups hold advanced degrees in relevant scientific disciplines, and others have worked in the pharmaceutical and biotechnology areas.
Thomas A. Wootton is former senior patent counsel at Pfizer in Kalamazoo, Mich. He has 30 years of experience in biological sciences and has practiced law for 20 of those years. He specializes in patent preparation and prosecution, and the preparation of patent and technology licensing agreements.
He is a member of the State Bar of Michigan, State Bar of California, District of Columbia Bar, American Bar Association, Kalamazoo County Bar Association, American Intellectual Property Law Association and Intellectual Property Owners Association. He is also registered with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.
A resident of Richland, Michigan, he received his J.D. from Hastings College of Law, University of California and his B.S. from the University of California at Davis, where he concentrated on chemistry, biochemistry and completed graduate work in agricultural chemistry.
Kelly T. Murphy specializes in patent, licensing and agreement matters, and represents large and small pharmaceutical, biotechnology companies and non-profits. He joins Miller Canfield from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease, NIH, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services in Bethesda, Md., where he was a technology development associate. His experience includes a research associate position at Human Genome Sciences, and an associate scientist position at Invitrogen, both in Rockville, Md.
He is a member of the American Bar Association, State Bar of Michigan, District of Columbia Bar Association, Kalamazoo County Bar Association, American Intellectual Property Law Association, and the American Association for the Advancement of Science.
A resident of Kalamazoo, Michigan, Murphy received his J.D. from the Columbus School of Law at The Catholic University of America, and holds a Master of Science from Western Michigan University with a concentration in molecular biology. He earned a B.S. from Western Michigan University where he majored in biological sciences with a minor in chemistry.
The law firm of Miller Canfield was established in Detroit in 1852 and employs more than 800 in offices in Michigan, Illinois, Massachusetts, Florida, New York, Canada and Poland.