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Waymo Verified
Autonomous Vehicles, Artificial Intelligence, Robotics, Automotive

Counsel, IP

San Francisco, CAHybridFull Time$251,000–$310,000 /yrPosted 11 days agoVisa sponsorship available

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Required skills

  • JD degree
  • state bar membership
  • autonomous driving technology
  • intellectual property portfolio
  • patent life cycle
  • patent harvest sessions
  • disclosure reviews
  • strategic filing decisions
  • global prosecution
  • portfolio maintenance

Nice to have

  • in-house experience
  • product
  • partnerships
  • marketing
  • leadership teams
  • integrated IP strategies

Role summary

Waymo's Legal team seeks an Intellectual Property Counsel to manage a global patent portfolio for autonomous driving technology. This hybrid role involves advising engineering, product, and business teams on IP issues, managing the full patent life cycle, and ensuring compliance with global regulations. The ideal candidate has a JD, state bar membership, USPTO admission, 6+ years of legal experience, and a strong technical background in autonomous vehicles or related hardware. Preferred experience includes in-house roles, technology licensing, patent litigation, and government agreements. The role requires strong execution, communication, and presentation skills, with an eagerness to work in a fast-paced startup environment.

Waymo is an autonomous driving technology company with the mission to be the world's most trusted driver. Since its start as the Google Self-Driving Car Project in 2009, Waymo has focused on building the Waymo Driver—The World's Most Experienced Driver™—to improve access to mobility while saving thousands of lives now lost to traffic crashes. The Waymo Driver powers Waymo’s fully autonomous ride-hail service and can also be applied to a range of vehicle platforms and product use cases. The Waymo Driver has provided over ten million rider-only trips, enabled by its experience autonomously driving over 100 million miles on public roads and tens of billions in simulation across 15+ U.S. states.

As part of Waymo's Legal team, you will work on the exciting legal issues surrounding our transformational autonomous driving technology and help drive our business lines forward from technology ideation through scaled commercial deployment. We partner with our public policy, safety, security and privacy experts to define transportation policy for the autonomous driving world to come, advising on regulatory changes that support and protect our users around the world. We collaborate with our engineering, product, strategy and operations teams to develop and protect our intellectual property portfolio and drive our corporate and commercial transactions. We ensure compliance with an increasingly complex and dynamic range of global regulations. And we anticipate, mitigate, and litigate high-profile and precedent-setting legal matters.

In this hybrid role, you will report to an Assistant General Counsel.

You will:

  • Strategically build and manage a global patent portfolio for key technology areas, including lidar, radar, camera, and compute, including managing the full patent life cycle, from conducting patent harvest sessions and disclosure reviews to strategic filing decisions, global prosecution, portfolio maintenance and strategic portfolio analysis, and managing outside patent counsel to ensure timely, high-quality, and targeted work product.
  • Advise business teams, product managers, engineers, and researchers on IP issues and provide counseling on IP terms in transactional matters.
  • Collaborate cross-functionally, with other legal team members and partnerships, product, and technical teams, on IP-related issues in agreements with partners, suppliers, vendors, and academic institutions.
  • Review and provide guidance on publications, presentations, marketing, and other public disclosures to manage IP risks and ensure confidential information is protected.
  • Manage responses to IP-related communications, working cross-functionally across legal and business teams, including potentially evaluating acquisition and licensing opportunities.

    • You have:

  • JD degree with a strong academic record, state bar membership, admitted to practice before the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, and 6+ years of relevant legal experience.
  • Solid technical background/understanding of technology used in autonomous vehicles, sensor hardware, or semiconductors.
  • Demonstrated experience in: managing a global patent portfolio and patent analysis, providing direct counseling to engineering and research teams, and advising on IP terms in commercial or collaboration agreements.
  • Experience with understanding cross-functional perspectives and navigating ambiguity. Ability to identify and create streamlined processes to support a growing company.
  • Execution-oriented individual with strong interpersonal, communication, and team skills. Experience presenting to senior management and technical teams.
  • Eagerness to work in a startup environment and flexibly roll up your sleeves as an individual contributor to help drive our fast-paced and dynamic business within an emerging and rapidly developing industry.

    • We prefer:

  • Prior in-house experience working side-by-side with engineering, product, partnerships, marketing, and leadership teams to spot, address, and counsel on IP issues.
  • Experience developing integrated IP strategies that support business goals, spanning patent prosecution, technology licensing, and patent litigation.
  • Demonstrated experience in: patent acquisition, licensing, litigation, and/or handling of third-party demands.
  • Experience advising on and negotiating agreements with government agencies and universities.

    • The expected base salary range for this full-time position across US locations is listed below. Actual starting pay will be based on job-related factors, including exact work location, experience, relevant training and education, and skill level. Your recruiter can share more about the specific salary range for the role location or, if the role can be performed remote, the specific salary range for your preferred location, during the hiring process.

    Waymo employees are also eligible to participate in Waymo’s discretionary annual bonus program, equity incentive plan, and generous Company benefits program, subject to eligibility requirements.

    Salary Range$251,000—$310,000 USD
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