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April 8, 2004

Intellectual property and Internet law expert, corporate law scholar to join Stanford Law School faculty

Mark Lemley, a leading scholar of patent, intellectual property and Internet law, will join the Stanford Law School faculty and assume the directorship of the Stanford Program in Law, Science and Technology this summer. Lemley, widely considered to be among the top intellectual property scholars in the nation, has written six books and more than 50 articles on patents, copyright and trademark, as well as antitrust and cyberspace law.

Lemley is currently a professor at Boalt Hall School of Law at the University of California-Berkeley, where he co-directs the Berkeley Center for Law and Technology.

"We are elated that Mark Lemley has chosen to come to Stanford," said Stanford Law School Dean Kathleen M. Sullivan. "Lemley has gained national renown among lawyers and scholars alike as a leading expert in intellectual property law. No one knows more than he does about patent law and the emerging law of the Internet. With Lemley now aboard, Stanford's Law, Science and Technology program could not possibly be stronger."

Noting the path-breaking research Lemley conducted under the auspices of Boalt's law and technology program, Sullivan said, "We have great respect for Berkeley's work in this area under Pam Samuelson's leadership, so we are especially pleased to have lured Lemley to our side of the Bay, where he no doubt will continue his scholarly interchange with colleagues throughout the valley and the Bay Area."

"Stanford's location in the heart of Silicon Valley makes it an ideal place to do research in technology law," Lemley said. "Stanford has a great collection of people in intellectual property and Internet law, including Larry Lessig, Paul Goldstein and others, and I'm looking forward to working with them. I am also looking forward to spending time with Stanford Law School's outstanding students," he said.

Lemley's major contributions to legal scholarship focus on how the economics and technology of the Internet affect patent law, copyright law and trademark law. He has conducted major empirical studies of patent issuance and of Internet standard-setting organizations that have helped illuminate how the economics of intellectual property differs across industries. And he has made important contributions to the public policy debate over how licensing and contracting should take place over the Internet. His prolific work is widely cited by scholars, policymakers and judges.

Lemley graduated from Stanford University in 1988 with a bachelor's degree in economics and political science, and earned a law degree from Boalt in 1991. He then served as a law clerk to Judge Dorothy Nelson at the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, and an intellectual property lawyer at the law firms of Brown & Bain and Fish & Richardson.

In 1994, Lemley joined the faculty of the University of Texas School of Law, where he was named the Marrs McLean Professor of Law. Six years later, he left Texas for Boalt Hall, where he became both a professor and co-director of the school's law and technology program. In the fall of 2003, Lemley was the Edwin A. Heafey, Jr. Visiting Professor at Stanford Law School. He continues to be of counsel to the San Francisco law firm of Keker and Van Nest on intellectual property, antitrust and Internet law.

Lemley's patent expertise complements the already strong faculty in Stanford Law School's Program in Law, Science & Technology, which includes copyright expert Paul Goldstein; cyberlaw expert Lawrence Lessig, who founded and directs the program's Center for Internet and Society; property law expert Margaret Jane Radin, who founded and directs the program's Center for E-Commerce; and biolaw expert Henry T. Greely, who founded and directs the program's new Center for Law and the Biosciences.

Robert M. Daines, an internationally known corporate law scholar, has been appointed the Law School's inaugural Pritzker Professor of Law and Business. Daines, whose work focuses on the empirical study of corporate practices and their implication for legal regulation, will also hold a courtesy appointment at the Stanford Graduate School of Business. Daines is currently a professor of law at New York University; he will join the Stanford faculty in July 2004.

"In an era when corporate governance is being closely scrutinized by the public, it is more important than ever to have sound empirical knowledge of how corporations really operate and how corporate law can help them operate better," said Stanford Law School Dean Kathleen Sullivan. "Daines has done path-breaking research that contributes enormously to this effort and is an ideal choice to train the next generation of our students."

"It is great to have a scholar of Rob Daines' caliber associated with the Business School," said Stanford Business School Dean Robert Joss. "He brings a unique law and business background of research and experience that will be of enormous benefit to our faculty and students."

Professor Daines' work analyzes data on corporate management and boards of directors. For example, he has used econometric methods to measure the impact on the value of a firm's shares of incorporating in Delaware, the leading state in the market for corporate charters. He concluded that firms that incorporated in Delaware do have higher market valuations than companies incorporated elsewhere, and that Delaware's takeover law, which empowers shareholders and constrains management, was a significant cause of that higher valuation.

Working with Stanford law Professor Michael Klausner, who is the Nancy and Charles Munger Professor of Business, Daines has also demonstrated that a significant percentage of firms making initial public offerings include in their charters substantial anti-takeover defenses. This work disproved the previous view among corporate law scholars that investors buying stock in initial public offerings will choose the corporate charter that maximizes firm value.

Daines' recent work focuses on various approaches to corporate governance, such as the use of classified boards of directors, which stagger the elections of classes of directors so that they cannot all be removed at one time in a hostile bid. His rigorous statistical analysis of empirical data has made his work a focal point for discussions among leading corporate law scholars and practitioners about the relationship between economic theory and the way that corporate institutions work in practice.

"I'm thrilled to join Stanford," Daines said. "It's is a wonderful place ­ pre-eminent law and business schools, a distinguished university, and great place to raise a family. I'm honored to be the first Pritzker Professor and looking forward to 30 years of law and business at Stanford."

"The selection of Robert Daines as the inaugural Pritzker Professor is an excellent one," said Penny S. Pritzker, a 1984 graduate of Stanford's JD/MBA program, and the driving force behind the Pritzker Foundation's establishment of the chair. "As a young scholar and teacher, he is tackling pivotal issues of corporate governance, and examining -- and sometimes debunking -- long-held assumptions about the way corporations conduct business. I am thrilled that, through the Pritzker Professorship, law and business students will have the opportunity to study with Rob, enhancing and broadening the education they will receive at Stanford."

Pritzker, who is partner in The Pritzker Organization and founder and chair of Classic Residences by Hyatt, said she has found her own joint law and business training at Stanford invaluable to her success as a corporate executive and director. She encouraged the Pritzker Foundation to establish the chair in an effort to bring the study of law and business together. "Stanford students launching their professional careers today will find the worlds of law and business are increasingly intertwined," Pritzker. Said. "Exposing these students to the work of professors of the caliber of Rob Daines will be critical to the training of this next generation of leaders."

Following graduation from Brigham Young University, where he earned bachelor's degrees in economics and American studies in 1989, and Yale University, where he earned a law degree in 1992, Daines was a law clerk to Hon. Ralph K. Winter on the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. He then worked for four years as a finance associate at the investment-banking firm of Goldman Sachs & Co. before joining the NYU law faculty in 1997.

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Contact

Judith Romero, Assistant Director of Communications, Stanford Law School: (650) 723-2232, judith.romero@stanford.edu

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