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Bird & Bird adds Patent Specialist Juliet Hibbert to its Renowned Intellectual Property Practice in London as Of Counsel

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International law firm Bird & Bird adds Of Counsel Juliet Hibbert to its renowned Intellectual Property practice in London.

Specialising in Standard Essential Patents (SEPs), Juliet has advised clients on all aspects of patent protection, including drafting new applications, filing and prosecution of patent applications, opposition proceedings, revocation actions, freedom to operate and infringement opinions. These clients are from a wide variety of sectors and range from private individuals, to SMEs through to blue-chip multinational corporations. She has broad experience of UK, EPO and worldwide patent protection in the areas of mobile telecommunications, healthcare, data transmission systems, video and image processing, speech recognition and other software systems, including the use of AI and machine learning. Juliet also has extensive in-house experience, having previously worked for BT and Nokia, building up a broad patent portfolio to protect its R&D and for licensing and cross-licensing purposes. She joins from Kilburn & Strode where she worked for 20 years.

Juliet’s arrival is part of the strategic expansion of Bird & Bird’s patent team in its Intellectual Property practice. In particular, her arrival will boost the team’s capabilities in relation to Tech & Comms patent (including SEP) advisory and litigation work.

The team has also recently welcomed associate Gregory Aroutiunian from JA Kemp as well as patent data analysts Dr Dimitar Dimov and Hilda Tillmanns who will be supporting the further development of Pattern, Bird & Bird’s patent portfolio intelligence consultancy offering, specialising in patent portfolio analytics, valuation and landscaping.

Robert Williams and Katharine Stephens, co-heads of the Intellectual Property practice in London at Bird & Bird say: “We are delighted to welcome Juliet to the team. She is a well-known expert in the SEP space, and her extensive experience will be an invaluable addition to our team and to the services we can offer our clients.”

Juliet adds: “I’m excited to join such a well-regarded patent team at Bird & Bird. I look forward to bolstering the practice and working with my new colleagues across the firm’s international network.”

Bird & Bird Advises All Shareholders On Their Exit From Berlin Fintech Firm FinCompare GmbH

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Bird & Bird has advised ING Ventures, Speedinvest, Elevator Ventures, UNIQA Ventures, and the other shareholders of Berlin-based FinCompare GmbH on the sale of the company to a consortium consisting of DZ Bank and several Volksbanken including Berliner Volksbank, Hannoversche Volksbank, Volksbank Mittweida, Raiffeisenbank im Hochtaunus, and Atruvia.

FinCompare is a Berlin-based fintech firm that focuses on providing intermediation and independent advice on corporate financing. More than 250 banks and alternative financiers are on the brokerage platform. To date, the company has processed over 30,000 loan applications with a financing value of over €3 billion EUR. The sophisticated software tool is also licensed to commercial banks as a white label solution. During the covid-19 crisis, FinCompare helped to overcome the SME credit crunch by making it quicker to process the brokering of attractive KfW loans.

FinCompare also aims to enable financial institutions to acquire new customers more efficiently through faster processes and opportunities for active risk management. In addition, customer advisors in banks who cannot or do not want to handle financing requests via their own bank should be able to do so with other financiers using the platform. Independent advisors and brokers in the SME segment will also be further strengthened so that they can independently find the right SME financing for their clients, irrespective of the provider.

The FinCompare shareholders were advised by the following Bird & Bird lawyers: partner Dr. Stefan Gottgetreu (Düsseldorf), Counsel Andrea Schlote (Munich), both leading on the transaction, and associates Dominic Poster, Benita Schild (both Düsseldorf), Marina Dolina (Munich), all Corporate, partner Dr. Martin Nebeling and associate Julia Neuper (both Düsseldorf, Employment Law), partner Dr. Stephan Waldheim (Düsseldorf, Antitrust Law).

Bird & Bird to Close Berlin Workspace Due to COVID-19 Impact

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Bird & Bird is closing its Berlin base due to the impact of COVID-19, a spokesperson confirmed on Tuesday.

The space, leased from a co-working provider, MindSpace, is located in Berlin’s Friedrichstrasse, near to the Brandenburg Gate.

Since the office was slated to house lawyers with business in Berlin temporarily, there are no job cuts associated with the closing of the space, according to the spokesperson.

The firm opened the base just over a year ago. It said at the time it would be used for client meetings and as a venue for conferences and events.

Bird & Bird has permanent German offices in Düsseldorf, Munich, Frankfurt and Hamburg.