IP, technology and business law for companies that build things — from chips to agents.
Patent prosecution and portfolio strategy, technology transactions, and the business counsel a technology company needs along the way. One attorney, who spent six years at Intel helping bring the 386, 486 and Pentium processors into production, then five more drafting and prosecuting Intel’s patents.
What I do
The work falls into four areas. Most clients need more than one of them, often in the same month.
- Patents
- Drafting and prosecuting complex patent applications in the United States, and coordinating with foreign counsel to secure international protection where it matters, backed by the electrical engineering and computer science depth to protect integrated hardware, firmware and software architectures within a single specification.
- Core technologies: the entire compute continuum — from semiconductors, microprocessors and FPGAs to embedded systems, machine learning pipelines, complex computational processes and enterprise cloud software
- Prosecution and advocacy: end-to-end U.S. prosecution and coordinated international filings, including examiner interviews, PTAB appeals and post-grant proceedings
- Strategic counseling: global portfolio architecture, competitive landscape analysis, and freedom-to-operate, non-infringement and validity opinions
- Technology transactions
- Agreements that put IP to work and keep ownership clear as products move from concept to market.
- Licenses, assignments and joint development agreements
- Development, supply and services agreements
- Open-source and AI model licensing terms
- IP diligence for financings and acquisitions
- Business law for technology companies
- Day-to-day counsel for founders and engineering-led companies, so legal questions get answered before they become problems.
- Commercial contracts and terms of service
- Founder, contractor and advisor IP arrangements
- Confidentiality and trade-secret programs
- Outside general counsel on an as-needed basis
- Disputes
- Pre-suit analysis, demand letters, licensing negotiations and post-grant proceedings, and coordination with litigation counsel when a matter goes to court.
- Infringement and invalidity analysis
- Inter partes review and ex parte reexamination
- Settlement and license negotiation
- Education
- BS, Electrical Engineering, Columbia
JD, Santa Clara University
MBAs, Columbia and London Business School - Admitted
- State Bar of California
U.S. Patent and Trademark Office
U.S. District Court, N.D. California
U.S. Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit - Meetings
- By Zoom anywhere in California. In person in the Bay Area and Los Angeles, and elsewhere by arrangement.
Alex Witkowski
Alex is a patent attorney who was an engineer first. He joined Intel in 1988 and spent six years in product development on the Intel386, 486 and Pentium processors — silicon debug, design and manufacturability verification, wafer-sort and package test — and was the first person to operate the original Pentium on first silicon. Intel then sponsored him through law school, and for five years he drafted and prosecuted the company's patents in microprocessor architecture, computer hardware and software, and semiconductor process technology.
He has run his own practice since 2008, prosecuting hardware, software and business-method applications and advising startups and established companies on IP strategy and the business decisions around it. A stint as a patent examiner at the USPTO gives him a working sense of how an application is read on the other side of the desk. Two MBAs, from a joint Columbia and London Business School program, inform the business side of the counsel.
The result is analysis and advice that bring together the technical, legal and business perspectives: grounded in how the technology works and what the company is trying to do with it, not only in how an invention is described in a specification.
Selected patents
Drafted and prosecuted for clients, and earlier for Intel.
- US 11,112,965 Text input error correction
- US 10,437,564 Object mapping and conversion system
- US 10,373,386 Virtually trying on clothing
- US 10,127,717 3D clothing model creation
- US 12,398,784 Rotary speed reducer
- US 8,417,698 Search based on social graphs and affinity groups
- US 8,296,812 Streaming video using erasure encoding
- US 8,135,061 Variable bit rate encoding
- US 8,498,808 Hybrid routing using breadcrumb paths
- US 7,725,343 Activity-based cost modeling
- US 5,898,610 Bit cell ground choking for improved memory write margin
- US 6,032,278 Method and apparatus for performing scan testing
- US 5,862,067 High numerical accuracy with MMX instructions
- US 5,840,448 Phase shifting mask
Get in touch
A first conversation is confidential and without obligation. Say what you are building and what you need, and you will hear back within one business day.
New clients: use the intake button — it opens Clio, the firm's secure intake system, and takes about 10 to 15 minutes. Or email alex@witkowskilaw.com.
Please do not include confidential technical details in a first message.
What happens next
- Send the intake form, book a meeting, or email.
- You hear back within one business day.
- A conflict check.
- A signed engagement letter, which begins the engagement.
- Phone
- 650‑488‑4500 — main line, voice and fax
310‑907‑7500 — Los Angeles line
Both lines ring through to Alex Witkowski. - Mailing address
- Witkowski Law
4546 El Camino Real B10 # 1020
Los Altos, CA 94022 - Hours
- Mon–Fri 9 am–6 pm; other times by appointment
- Meetings
- Most meetings are held by Zoom: private, efficient, and no commute. In-person meetings are by arrangement.
- Service area
- Clients anywhere in California by Zoom. In person in the Bay Area and Los Angeles; elsewhere in California by arrangement.