Michael D. Rechtin

Michael Rechtin is a retired partner and was an intellectual property lawyer with Foley & Lardner LLP. He provided business counseling in the intellectual property area, including domestic and international patent and trademark acquisition, due diligence in mergers and acquisitions, financing matters, licensing, and litigation. Mr. Rechtin's technical background and training encompasses physics, chemistry, mechanical engineering, and biotechnology. Mr. Rechtin was a member of the firm's Mechanical & Electromechanical Technologies and Chemical, Biotechnology & Pharmaceutical Practices. He was also a member of the Technology, Energy, and Life Sciences Industry Teams.

Mr. Rechtin has substantial engineering experience in many aspects of materials science and mechanical engineering. In particular, he has extensive knowledge in the areas of renewable energy technology, biomedical devices, metallurgy, ceramics, semiconductors, polymers, computer controlled systems, business method patents, solid state science and nanotechnology science.

Within the petroleum technology area, Mr. Rechtin has experience as a patent agent and patent attorney for Amoco Oil (now BP). His substantial patent work in many areas of such technology ranges from catalytic sciences, crude exploration geosciences area, petroleum refining and downstream chemical processing to production of end products. While serving as a scientist at Argonne National Laboratory, Mr. Rechtin also was involved in materials science and engineering, solar energy technology, environmental processing and shale oil and tar sands processing technology.

Recognition

In recognition of his experience, Mr. Rechtin has been Peer Review Rated as AV® Preeminent™, the highest performance rating in Martindale-Hubbell's peer review rating system. Mr. Rechtin is also listed as a “Leading Lawyer” in Chicago. In 2014, The Legal 500 recognized him for his work in patent licensing and transactional.

Education

Mr. Rechtin graduated from Illinois Institute of Technology Chicago Kent College of Law (J.D., with honors, 1983); Massachusetts Institute of Technology (Ph.D., solid state science and materials science, 1970); and the University of Illinois (B.S., materials science and engineering, 1966). He also was an IBM post-doctoral fellow at MIT from 1970-72.

Admissions

Mr. Rechtin is admitted to practice in Wisconsin and Illinois, and before the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office and the Courts of Appeals for the Federal Circuit and the Northern District of Illinois.

Selected Publications

Mr. Rechtin was active as editor of the Foley publication The Biomedical Device Newsletter. He has also authored numerous technical and legal articles. In the realm of law, including:

• "Creating and Maintaining Value in a Business Using Trademark Protection," Client Times, Feb. 1993
• "Intellectual Property Due Diligence for the Buyer or Seller of a Business," The Law Works, Feb. 1994
• "Intellectual Property: Ticking Time Bombs for the Unwary Buyer," Mergers and Acquisitions, Jan. 1992

He also has written more than 50 technical publications for chemical and physics journals.