Two Embarcadero Center Suite 1900, San Francisco, CA USA 94111
1801 Century Park East Suite 2300, Los Angeles, CA USA 90067
April Abele Isaacson is the Managing Partner for the firm's San Francisco office.
April has more than 25 years of experience as a trial attorney and has focused her practice on patent litigation and related disputes since 2000. She is a registered U.S. patent attorney and has tried cases involving diverse areas of technology ranging from computer and telecommunications hardware and software to life sciences, medical devices, and chemical products, representing both plaintiffs and defendants.
April has advised clients and participated in all phases of patent litigation, from initial counseling up through trial and appeal. She regularly counsels life sciences companies in all aspects of patent and related regulatory strategy from the early discovery stages through clinical trials and product approval. She has led teams in federal courts nationwide, as well as PTAB proceedings and has argued appeals before the Federal Circuit.
April previously served for nearly five years as in-house counsel at a public specialty pharmaceutical company where she provided broad intellectual property and regulatory strategic counseling during all stages of product development and managed numerous Hatch-Waxman litigations. Prior to that role, she served as a partner at a major international law firm and at a predecessor firm to Kilpatrick.
April began her legal career as a U.S. Navy JAG Corps prosecutor where she won several high-profile jury cases and earned multiple achievement medals and letters of commendation for superior service and leadership. Before attending law school, she was an HIV/AIDS research scientist at Boston Children’s Hospital.
April is listed in the 2024 The Best Lawyers in America®: Biotechnology and Life Sciences Practice and 2021 and 2022 editions of IAM Strategy 300: The World's Leading IP Strategists. She was honored as one of the "Most Influential Women in Bay Area Business" in 2022 by San Francisco Business Times. Outside her legal practice, April is an accomplished blogger and podcaster. She is the Founding Editor of MEMO blog and is the Founder and Co-Host of Sidebars, a podcast featuring leading women and other underrepresented groups in patent law.
Experience
Defended Nalu Medical in a patent lawsuit filed by Nevro over spinal cord stimulators, which included injunctive relief to prevent Nalu from commercializing its recently FDA-approved neurostimulation system. On the eve of the claim construction hearing in Delaware, and shortly before the PTAB’s institution decision of Nalu’s IPR Petition challenging Nevro’s patent was due, we obtained a favorable settlement for Nalu. Nevro Corp. v. Nalu Medical, Inc., No. 1-20-cv-00291 (D. Del.) and Nalu Medical, Inc. v. Nevro Corp., IPR2021-01023 (PTAB)
Representing private digital business card company in patent litigation related to NFC technology.
Representing mobile computing company in patent litigation related to wireless communication systems.
Representing private telecommunications company in litigations involving MoCA and wideband technology.
Representing global technology company in patent litigation related to data storage technologies.
Counseling clinical-stage biopharma company on patent portfolio and regulatory strategies.
Representing global consumer electronics company in patent litigation related to Wi-Fi chipsets.
Representing global consumer electronics company in patent litigation related to location services and notifications.
Representing mobile phone manufacturer in patent litigation involving camera lens optical imaging systems.
Representing radiosurgery device innovator in multi-jurisdictional patent proceedings.
Represented a pharmaceutical company in Hatch-Waxman litigations concerning a drug for treatment of opioid- induced constipation.
Represented a pharmaceutical company in Hatch-Waxman litigations concerning a drug for early-onset childhood epilepsy.
Represented a pharmaceutical company in an adversarial patent action with a non-practicing patent holder.
Served as an expert witness in a confidential arbitration proceeding related to a Hatch-Waxman trial.
Counseled a clinical-stage biopharma company on portfolio strategy and development partnerships.
Represented a pharmaceutical company in Hatch-Waxman litigation concerning a drug for treating diarrhea and irritable bowel syndrome.
Represented a leading agricultural chemical company and a specialty pest control chemical manufacturer in a patent litigation concerning pesticide products.
Represented a pharmaceutical company in a Hatch-Waxman litigation concerning a synthetic vitamin drug.
Represented a manufacturer of biological and pharmaceutical products for animals in patent infringement and license dispute litigations related to vaccines, vaccine components, and recombinant DNA techniques for manufacturing vaccines.
Represented developer of innovative rapid point-of-care diagnostic tests and diabetes self-monitoring products in patent litigation.
Represented designer and manufacturer of laser vision correction systems in patent infringement litigation.
Represented early-stage pharmaceutical company in proceeding for breach of joint development agreement and correction of inventorship in federal court and AAA arbitration.
Represented manufacturer of human vaccine product in multi-jurisdictional patent litigations.
Represented technology company in multiple patent litigations involving dynamic random-access memory (DRAM) and multimedia processors.
Represented technology company in patent litigations concerning power MOSFET semiconductors.
Represented technology company in patent infringement and license dispute litigations related to digital signal processing (DSP) technology.
Represented technology company in patent litigation related to chipsets, including accelerated graphics (GPUs).
Insights View All
Blogs
Vanderbilt University School of Law J.D. (1995)
The University of Chicago M.S. (1990) Pharmacological and Physiological Sciences, Committee on Cellular and Molecular Physiology
Mount Holyoke College A.B. (1988) Biological Sciences, cum laude
California (1995)
District of Columbia (1997)
U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit
U.S. District Court for the Central District of California
U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of California
U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas
U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California
U.S. District Court for the Southern District of California
U.S. District Court for the Western District of Texas
U.S. Patent and Trademark Office
CalVet Women Veterans Division, Member
U.S. Navy, Prosecutor/Officer-in-Charge, Criminal Defense and Legal Assistance Attorney (1995-1999 Active Duty; 1999-2003 Reserve)
San Francisco Intellectual Property Law Association, Member
American Intellectual Property Law Association, Member
Federal Circuit Bar Association, Member
MEMO|Medicine & Molecules, The Kilpatrick Biopharma Industry Blog, Founding Editor
Law360, Life Sciences Editorial Advisory Board (2023)
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