Sarah E. Spires

Sarah E. Spires is a registered patent attorney and focuses her practice on inter partes reviews (IPRs), patent infringement litigation, and advising clients relating to intellectual property transactions and disputes, privacy, and consumer products. She has been named by Super Lawyers as a Texas Rising Star from 2016-2020, and in 2020, was also named one of the Texas Rising Stars Up-and-Coming 50 Women.

Sarah has been lead or back-up counsel on over 70 IPRs spanning a wide range of technologies, and has been named one of the “Top 50 Women in PTAB Trials” by the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) Bar Association. She has significant experience and expertise in briefing and arguing cases to final written decision before the PTAB. In addition to representing both patent owners and petitioners in proceedings before the PTAB, she also counsels clients in relation to anticipated and ongoing IPR proceedings. Sarah serves as independent IPR counsel for clients involved in district court litigation with other counsel, and also represents existing litigation clients involved in IPR proceedings in parallel to district court litigation.

Sarah has also successfully tried numerous cases to verdict in jury and bench trials throughout the country, and to final decisions in arbitration proceedings throughout the world. Her district court litigation and trial expertise includes Paragraph IV disputes under the Hatch-Waxman Act (generic and brand), brand-versus-brand pharmaceutical litigation, and traditional patent litigation involving biotechnology, medical devices, computer software, semiconductors, artificial intelligence, hand tools, LCD technology, and wireless and telecommunications devices. Sarah also represents clients in various types of complex commercial litigation matters, including trademark infringement, trade secret disputes, contractual and patent licensing disputes, aviation litigation, and antitrust and false claims act cases.

In addition, Sarah has significant experience practicing before the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. She has successfully briefed and argued numerous cases on behalf of clients involved in appeals from IPRs and district court litigations that Sarah has handled, as well as on behalf of new clients changing counsel for appeal. Most recently, Sarah obtained a favorable precedential opinion for her client in Gensetix, Inc. v. Board of Regents of University of Texas System, 966 F.3d 1316 (Fed. Cir. 2020).

Sarah’s technical background includes conducting cell cycle research at MIT’s David H. Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research. Prior to joining Skiermont Derby LLP, she was a senior associate at Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher LLP in Dallas, and previously worked as an associate in the San Diego and Tokyo offices of Morrison & Foerster LLP.

Sarah speaks regularly on issues relating to recent developments in inter partes reviews before the Patent Trial and Appeal Board, as well on various topics related to patent litigation, particularly in the pharmaceutical arena.

Sarah graduated from the University of California, Berkeley School of Law in 2007, where she served on the Berkeley Technology Law Journal and was a member of the Jessup International Law Moot Court Competition NW Regional Championship Team. She earned her bachelor’s degree in biology from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.