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Primary Practice Areas:

Industry Focus:

Education:

  • George Mason University School of Law J.D.
  • Grove City College, B.S.

Bar Admissions:

  • Virginia
  • U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia
  • U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit
  • U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit
  • United States Patent and Trademark Office

Languages:

  • English

Charles (Chad) F. Wieland III focuses his practice on patent law. He protects his clients’ IP rights through licensing, assignment and when necessary, litigation. His clients range from startups to Fortune 100 companies, both domestic and international, and he helps these businesses steer clear of interference from the IP rights of others with design-around recommendations, validity, infringement, and clearance/freedom-to-operate studies, both formal and informal. He often negotiates and drafts software licenses and other technology transfer agreements.

Charles (Chad) F. Wieland III focuses his practice on patent law. He protects his clients’ IP rights through licensing, assignment and when necessary, litigation. His clients range from startups to Fortune 100 companies, both domestic and international, and he helps these businesses steer clear of interference from the IP rights of others with design-around recommendations, validity, infringement, and clearance/freedom-to-operate studies, both formal and informal. He often negotiates and drafts software licenses and other technology transfer agreements.

With more than three decades of experience, he finds cost effective ways to acquire or capture and exploit worldwide IP rights of clients, while avoiding or mitigating the hazards posed by the IP rights of others. He has been highly successful in defending patents in re-examination and contested cases (inter partes proceedings) at the USPTO, and as of June 2022, he has not lost a contested case. He has also assisted with oppositions in the European Patent Office.

His approach is to know the business of his clients and to find practical, business-oriented solutions to opportunities and problems facing clients. He has helped take clients from inventive concept to $100 million exits.

Chad has also been involved with IP issues surrounding standard setting bodies and patent pools, including helping to form policies, acquiring, and having standard blocking or essential patents recognized as such by the licensing authority.

Chad works with business methods and software-implemented inventions, and is a leader among his peers by having extensive experience working with patent applications on blockchain and distributed ledger technologies in the U.S. His work also includes e-commerce and targeted advertising, yield management, healthcare records and reimbursement management tools, complex financial instruments and measurement tools, presentation capture and publishing and credit and debit card processing products.

He has a great deal of experience and strong background in a wide range of technologies involving display devices; MEMs; microfluidics; carbon nanotube production and application in electron emitters and display devices; nano-scale electrical components and nano-scale signal processors and storage devices; clean technology, including fuel cells, smart grid and solar power; transistors; light emitting diodes (LEDs); laser diodes and other semiconductor device structures; optical systems, including cameras, auto focus systems, lens systems, optical fibers and fiber optic switches; optical disc structures; infrared systems; and magnetic memory structures and materials.

In addition, Chad has written and prosecuted many applications on cellular telephony, and other wireless devices (e.g., IEEE 802.11, FDMA, CDMA, TDMA, PSK, QSK, etc.), planar antennas and other electrical, electronic, electro-mechanical, applied physics and mechanical arts.

Chad has been honored by his peers in the legal community and selected to the Virginia Super Lawyers® list in the area of IP prosecution and has been selected by his peers for inclusion in The Best Lawyers in America© under the Litigation – Patent and Litigation – Intellectual Property categories and was named the Best Lawyers 2021 Litigation – Intellectual Property “Lawyer of the Year” award in Washington, D.C. In 2019 and 2018, Chad was recognized in IAM’s Patent 1000 list, the best-in-class listing of patent prosecution, licensing, and litigation practitioners. In 2020, Chad was named an IP Star by Managing Intellectual Property. He was also recognized in the category of Intellectual Property in the Corporate Counsel Super Lawyers® list. He and two others founded the Pauline Newman American Inn of Court in Alexandria, Virginia, which is an Inn focused on bench, bar and PTO relations and mentoring.

 

Memberships
  • Pauline Newman IP American Inn of Court, Founding Master, Chair of the Formation Committee
  • Atlantic Nano Forum (aka Emerging Tech Forum), Co-founder
  • Virginia State Bar, Intellectual Property Section, past Chair; Intellectual Property & Information Technology Law Section Council Member
  • American Bar Association, Intellectual Property Law Section, past chair of the Information Retrieval Committee 704

Best Lawyers of America 2015 – Present

  • Intellectual Property “Lawyer of the Year” 2021

Corporate Counsel Super Lawyers®

IP Star, Managing IP – 2020, 2024

Patent 1000 List – 2018, 2019

Virginia Super Lawyers

 

Chad enjoys the hobby of woodworking in his spare time.

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Panitch Schwarze commits the time to listen to and evaluate each client’s unique needs so we can advise on the best forms of IP protection.

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