Bahrad A. Sokhansanj, Ph.D., Esq.

I am an experienced litigator and co-founder of a new law firm leveraging technological innovation to deliver unparalleled results. Our focus is on representing consumers, entrepreneurs, and creators in intellectual property and consumer protection matters. We empower clients in strategic disputes where they face power imbalances. By developing and deploying cutting-edge AI tools, we amplify our clients' legal firepower, enabling them to successfully navigate challenges, ethically innovate, and create value.At GroundsAI, a parallel startup we've co-founded, we are creating an adaptable, results-focused Legal AI platform. Our agentic AI tools act as force multipliers for litigation and proactive legal strategies, enabling businesses to navigate complex legal landscapes and negotiations in real-time. We intend to release both free and commercial tools to support the legal community, for-profit and non-profit enterprises, and individual people.After receiving my law degree from Columbia, I clerked on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. My career at law firms and as an independent practitioner has focused on high-stakes plaintiff-side IP litigation, including against the biggest names in Tech ilike Apple, Amazon, and Google. I have represented clients in federal courts nationwide, ITC, and USPTO. I also advise entrepreneurs on startup issues and IP strategy, and I have volunteered to represent clients pro bono in tenant protection and civil rights cases. I have worked on matters involving a wide range of products and software, including cloud computing, aerospace materials, semiconductors, smartphone cameras, interior countertops, and personal care products.My career before law built an enduring interest in the intersection of law and technology. I earned a PhD and worked as an Assistant Professor in Biomedical Engineering. Post-COVID, I have advanced my skills in deep learning and authored peer-reviewed articles in computational biology and legal AI.

• Co-counsel with a major national litigation firm for Kove in a patent case against Amazon in the Northern District of Illinois involving technology for hyper-scalability of cloud storage using distributed hash table storage and other methods. Kove prevailed in a multi-hundred million dollar jury award in Kove's favor in April 2024.• Co-counsel with a major national litigation firm representing VideoLabs against Starz in the District of Delaware. Litigation pending after successfully prevailing on motions to dismiss pursuant to 35 USC 101 and going through fact and expert discovery.• Represented Arconic Inc. (f/k/a Alcoa) in a multi-hundred million dollar trade secret dispute with Universal Alloy Corporation in the Northern District of Atlanta, involving allegations of theft of trade secrets used for the manufacture of critical aircraft wing components.• Represented Corephotonics in litigation against Apple in the Northern District of California relating to foundational mobile camera and image processing patents. Prevailed in non-institution of IPRs and final decisions on key patents involved in the lawsuit. The matter reached a favorable settlement in 2024.• Represented Linksmart in patent litigation against Gogo Wi-Fi, Panasonic Avionics, and a number of hotels and airlines using their services for in-flight and in-hotel wireless. Prevailed in denying institution of IPR on the patent at issue in the case.• Represented Immersion Corp. in patent litigation against Fitbit involving haptics technology focused on the use of tactile feedback in electronic devices. The cases reached a favorable settlement.• Represented Wilsonart in defending against a design patent case before the International Trade Commission involving engineered quartz technology. Obtained a dismissal of all claims on the eve of trial.• Represented Ericsson in litigation against Apple in an Eastern District of Texas patent case involving complex telecommunications technologies through claim construction, arguing at Markman. The case reached a favorable settlement.• Represented Allure Energy in multiple patent cases involving smart thermostats. The first case, against Nest, involved claims relating to use of Allure's technology in a popular smart thermostat platform. The case went to trial in the Eastern District of Texas and reached a favorable settlement. Also represented Allure in a case against Honeywell relating to smart thermostat patents in Austin federal court, which reached a favorable settlement.• Represented STMicroelectronics against InvenSense in patent litigation at the International Trade Commission relating to various design and manufacturing technologies for MEMS-based gyroscopes and accelerometers used in smartphones, tablets and other devices. The litigation reached a favorable settlement for STMicroelectronics.

Bahrad earned a Ph.D. in engineering, worked as a professor at a major research university, graduated from Columbia Law School, clerked at the Federal Circuit, and practiced law at national firms — experiences which allow him to advise and represent clients from a unique and creative perspective. Bahrad has personally developed many machine learning and artificial intelligence models and applications, including in the areas of legal practice, intellectual property, and computational biology.Bahrad is a named inventor of multiple patents, including for machine learning for drug design and multi-agent networks for explainable artificial intelligence.As a researcher, Bahrad is widely published in the fields of computational biology, with scores of published articles which have been cited over a thousand times. A selection of his articles is below.Motin, Sokhansanj, et al., Genetic Variability of Yersinia pestis Isolates as Predicted by PCR-Based IS100 Genotyping and Analysis of Structural Genes Encoding Glycerol-3-Phosphate, Journal of bacteriology 184 (4), 1019-1027 (2002)Motin, Sokhansanj, et al., Temporal Global Changes in Gene Expression during Temperature Transition in Yersinia pestis, Journal of bacteriology 186 (18), 6298-6305 (2004)Rosen, Sokhansanj, et al., Metagenome fragment classification using N-mer frequency profiles, Advances in Bioinformatics (2008)Sokhansanj, et al., A quantitative model of human DNA base excision repair. I. Mechanistic insights Nucleic acids research 30 (8), 1817-1825 (2002)Fitch, Sokhansanj, et al., Linear fuzzy gene network models obtained from microarray data by exhaustive search, BMC bioinformatics 5, 1-12 (2004)Sokhansanj, et al., Linear fuzzy gene network models obtained from microarray data by exhaustive search, BMC bioinformatics 5, 1-12 (2004)Kriete, Sokhansanj, et al., Systems approaches to the networks of aging, Ageing research reviews 5 (4), 434-448 (2006)Zhao, Sokhansanj, et al., Genetic grouping of SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus sequences using informative subtype markers for pandemic spread visualization, PLoS computational biology 16 (9), e1008269 (2020)

• Bahrad is committed to including public service as part of his practice. He has successfully represented tenants of rent-controlled apartments pro bono in wrongful eviction proceedings in state court. He has also sought relief on behalf of multiple plaintiffs in federal civil rights litigation. While at Columbia, he was a member of the Environmental Law Clinic, where he advocated on behalf of environmental non-profit organizations in regulatory and court proceedings. He also interned at the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), working on digital privacy and free speech issues.

• Bahrad is a member of the State Bar of California, admitted to practice in multiple, and is registered to practice before the United States Patent & Trademark Office. He has practiced before District Courts nationwide, the Federal Circuit, California state courts, the ITC, and the Patent and Trials Appeal Board.