Finnegan opened an office in Dallas, its first in Texas and second new opening since Munich in 2022. Texas is a state that is an important market for intellectual property-related matters largely due to the volume of patent litigation cases filed in its federal courts.
Hope Shimabuku, former regional director of the United States Patent and Trademark Office’s Southwest Regional Outreach Office will lead the new office. Former McKool Smith trial and appellate principal, Christian Hurt joins the team as a partner and member of the firm’s existing Texas trial practice.
In an exclusive interview with the Texas Lawyer, Finnegan managing partner James Barney said Texas has always been important to the firm and its clients, because roughly one-third of the firm’s litigation is in Texas and that share is increasing.
"The importance of the Texas court system for the work we do for our clients is increasingly important and [there is] the boom going on in Texas with more and more businesses moving to Texas," he said.
Christian said moving to Finnegan is a "humongous" opportunity, and a kind of a reunion for him, because it has more Federal Circuit clerks than any other firm — he clerked at the Federal Circuit — and he knows a number of lawyers at the firm, and faced some in court on IP litigation.
According to Christian, his move to Finnegan benefits his clients, because the firm has lawyers who can handle full IP services as well as great trial lawyers.
"Services that Finnegan can offer — that a lot of other places can’t — is on the litigation and trial side, and also on the counseling side and the prosecution side," he said.
Hope said when she decided to return to private practice, after her time at the USPTO, it was a "great" opportunity to join a firm like Finnegan, which is known globally for its IP practice.
James added that the Dallas office is the first U.S. office the firm has opened in about 20 years, and the firm has recently concentrated on growing the Munich office and the London Office. Finnegan worked for quite a while in making sure they had the right people to launch the Dallas office, which is full-service and provides litigation, transactional, and counseling and prosecution services.
