U.S. intellectual property boutique Groombridge, Wu, Baughman & Stone (GWBS) has established an office in Tokyo and hired patent litigator Maxwell Fox from McDermott Will & Emery to lead it.  

For GWBS, which was set up barely nine months ago, the Tokyo outpost becomes the third office, and its first outside the U.S. In a statement, it said the new office would support Japanese and East Asian clients in industries including life sciences/bio-pharma, electronics, automotive, chemicals, telecom and consumer products on IP disputes in the U.S.

“We are excited to expand our global footprint and establish a presence in Japan. We have been committed to this critical market,” said partner Nicholas Groombridge in the statement. “We will grow and deepen our relationships with world-leading science and technology companies based in Japan and Asia.”

Fox has spent the last 17 years in Tokyo and is authorised as a gaikokuho jimu bengoshi (licensed foreign lawyer). He advises on patent cases and represents clients before U.S. District Courts, the International Trade Commission, the Federal Circuit, and the Supreme Court. Fox’s patent expertise spans telecommunications and network security, chemical compounds and manufacturing processes, imaging solutions, digital displays, medical devices and pharmaceutical innovations.

Prior to joining McDermott in 2021, Fox was also a partner at Jones Day, Ropes & Gray, and Paul Hastings.

GWBS was founded last November by four patent litigators who had previously worked together at Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison, namely Groombridge, Jennifer H. Wu, J. Steven Baughman and Eric Alan Stone. The firm now has 25 lawyers in the U.S., including seven partners.