Helen Jones - Life Sciences & Chemistry

Partner

Helen joined Gill Jennings & Every in 1984 after a brief period with another firm of patent attorneys. She has an honours degree in Natural Sciences from Cambridge University, specialising in biochemistry. She qualified as a Chartered Patent Attorney in 1986 and as a European Patent Attorney in 1987, and became a partner in 1991.

Her technical competence extends to a range of life sciences, primarily organic chemistry and materials based areas, including drug delivery, medical devices, polymer science and technology, pharmaceutical chemistry, protein, nucleic acid and polysaccharide chemistry.

Helen has enjoyed working directly with corporate clients of all sizes, advising them as they have built patent portfolios to further their business aims. In the last decade she has been the author of reports on the IP holdings of several companies for admission documents for initial public offerings which have helped to raise many millions of pounds on the stock market. She has also been involved with several other portfolio reports for investors at various stages of investment, from licensing to company acquisition.

Her practice includes a significant level of patent drafting and prosecution around the world, as well as filing and defending oppositions and appeals at the European Patent Office, where she has a good deal of advocacy experience. She also does a significant amount of work on freedom to operate reviews and opinions on third party rights. She has also procured supplementary protection certificates on several authorised products around Europe.

Helen has always been interested in the law and how its changes affect practice. She is currently the chair of the firm's Business Operations Committee, she is also responsible for the Patent Formalities Department, and oversees the editing of the UK section of the Manual of Industrial Property Law, the acknowledged bible on patents, designs and trade marks around the world. She is training two technical assistants and is also an examiner for one of the UK final qualifying examinations.

Link to PDF download