Patent Litigation Firm Groombridge, Wu, Baughman & Stone LLP Opens Tokyo Office

Prominent Japan-based patent litigator Maxwell Fox joins firm as partner to head Tokyo office

TOKYO & NEW YORK--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Groombridge, Wu, Baughman & Stone LLP, a patent litigation boutique launched a little more than nine months ago in New York and Washington DC, announces that it has opened an office in Tokyo to represent Japan-based clients with intellectual property disputes in the United States, led by prominent Japan-based U.S. patent litigator Maxwell ("Mac") Fox.

The new office, located in Tokyo’s Marunouchi business hub, will work closely with the firm’s U.S. offices to represent leading Japanese and East Asian companies in a broad spectrum of industries including life sciences/bio-pharma, electronics, automotive, chemicals, telecom and consumer products.

Groombridge Wu was formed late last November by four preeminent patent litigators who had previously worked together for many years at Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison LLP. The firm has grown to some 25 lawyers at its US locations. To expand into one of the world’s key technology and innovation hubs the firm tapped Mr. Fox, an eminent litigator with 25 years of experience handling complex cross-border IP disputes.

Mr. Fox has handled patent cases in District Courts throughout the United States, Section 337 actions before the International Trade Commission, and appeals to the Federal Circuit and to the United States Supreme Court. His matters have spanned the patent landscape, including telecommunications and network security, chemical compounds and manufacturing processes, imaging solutions, digital displays, medical devices and pharmaceutical innovations.

Fluent in Japanese, Mr. Fox has spent the last 17 years in Tokyo and is authorized as a Gaikokuho Jimu Bengoshi (Licensed Foreign Law Specialist) to advise companies there on US law. He is a frequent lecturer on IP law, has spoken before the Japan Patent Attorneys Association and at Taiwan’s Chung Hwa Research Institute. He has also been a guest lecturer at Yamanashi University and Keio University Law School. He is a member of the Daini Tokyo Bar Association, the American Bar Association and the American Intellectual Property Law Association, and has previously served as a master of the Tokyo IP American Inn of Court.

New York-based partner Nicholas Groombridge said, “We are excited to expand our global footprint and establish a presence in Japan. We have been committed to this critical market for many years, beginning long before we created our new firm. Groombridge Wu’s new Tokyo office and our partnership with Mac will grow and deepen our relationships with world-leading science and technology companies based in Japan and Asia, helping us meet the challenges and reduce the burdens they face in executing their global litigation strategies.”

Washington, DC-based partner J. Steven Baughman, who has known Mr. Fox since they worked together at another international law firm in Japan, said, “I’m so fortunate to be Mac’s partner again. I can’t think of a better cornerstone for our firm in Tokyo. Mac is widely known and uniformly respected here, and his IP litigation experience is unmatched in this market.”

Mr. Fox said, “Having worked at large firms my entire career, the opportunity to join an elite boutique firm where I already know the leaders and have long relationships with my new colleagues is a unique pleasure. Groombridge Wu’s Tokyo office will focus on a single area of practice for which there is a great deal of demand. Our structure and size mean we can be flexible and yet retain capacity for growth. It’s tremendously exciting to join an endeavor like this at such an early stage, and even better with people you know and respect. I look forward to bringing what I know to helping Groombridge Wu grow in Japan.”

In addition to Messrs. Groombridge and Baughman, Groombridge Wu was co-founded by leading patent litigators Jennifer H. Wu and Eric Alan Stone, both of whom focus on high-stakes patent and related technology litigation in a broad range of industries. Immediately after founding the firm, the four were joined as partners by two long-term colleagues, Megan F. Raymond and Josephine Young. The partners’ track record of success has already led to industry recognition: after only nine months, the firm has been ranked and recommended in key industry publications such as Chambers and IAM, and repeatedly identified as a 2023 “firm to watch.”

Groombridge, Wu, Baughman & Stone LLP is a patent litigation firm. We try cases in court, in arbitrations, in the International Trade Commission, and before the Patent Trial and Appeal Board, and argue appeals before the Federal Circuit. We are nationally recognized thought leaders on patent issues, as well as on issues of social justice. And we are teachers, training the next generation of patent litigators. We have a long track record of achieving successful outcomes for our clients both in the courtroom and in the boardroom. For more visit: https://www.groombridgewu.com/.

James Bourne jimbournenyc@aol.com
Allan Ripp 646-285-1779 arippnyc@aol.com