Alumni Profiles Series: Jeff Mills

Jeff Mills received his Ph.D. in mechanical engineering from Duke in 2002, following the completion of his undergraduate degree in biomedical engineering (B.S.E.), also at Duke. Upon the completion of both his undergraduate and graduate degrees, Jeff went on to earn his Juris Doctor (J.D.) degree from the George Washington University Law School, while simultaneously working as a student associate at the D.C.-based law firm Sterne Kessler Goldstein & Fox as part of a Technical Specialist program. After rising through the ranks at law firm Fanelli Haag from senior associate to partner, Jeff and prior colleagues created the intellectual property boutique law firm Medler Ferro Woodhouse & Mills in 2016, where he currently holds the title of principal. Jeff’s law practice specializes in IP issues related to nanotechnology, biotechnology, and more.

Tell me about yourself and how you came to Duke.

I studied biomedical engineering while an undergraduate student at Duke. During my third year, I wrote an article published in The DukEngineer on Duke MEMS Professor (now) Emeritus David Needham and his work on nanoparticles for cancer research. That led to an opportunity to do a summer internship with his group and the Duke Cancer Institute towards the end of my degree. I enjoyed my summer research, and it rolled seamlessly into the following fall term when I started my Ph.D. in Dr. Needham’s lab, focusing again on cancer and drug delivery research areas.

Toward the end of my Ph.D. program, I had to complete an external internship from Duke as a requirement for one of my graduate fellowships. My advisor had a connection in the competitive intelligence department at GlaxoSmithKline (GSK), a pharmaceutical company. At the time, I was aiming for a career in an industry lab setting. However, after my internship at GSK, I became drawn to the idea of merging technology and science, which I was passionate about, with the broader context of how these fields intersect with business and society. This experience led me to pursue a career in patent law.

Why did you decide to stay at Duke for a Ph.D.?

I continued at Duke and joined the Needham lab for my Ph.D. because I really enjoyed the research the Needham group was doing in the bioscience field. As an undergraduate student, starting a project helped me plan my research path, which I continued when I began my Ph.D. I enjoyed my time at Duke as an undergraduate, so staying in Durham and at Duke for a few more years worked for me.

Why did you decide to pursue law school after your Ph.D.?

There is a path called Technical Specialist at many law firms that do intellectual property law. New and recent graduates (those with bachelor of science degrees are eligible, but many firms place a hiring emphasis on candidates with Ph.Ds.) are hired to work at the law firm and attend law school in the evenings. That is the path I chose to obtain my legal education, and it was a great way to get both real work experience and the necessary formal legal education.

I worked full-time for almost a year at Sterne Kessler Goldstein & Fox after completing my Ph.D. before starting law school. I spent four years in law school, typical for those in the Technical Specialist role, while the traditional law school program takes three years to complete. One significant benefit of taking the Technical Specialist route is that you are paid for your work at the firm, and there is typically a tuition reimbursement payment plan available to help with the high cost of law school. This allowed me to earn an additional degree at a reduced price, gain work experience while getting paid, and finish law school as a third- or fourth-year associate at the firm.

Initially, it was challenging to wrap my head around the idea of returning to school. I considered my options, one of which was pursuing a career as a scientist in industry, where I would need to work for three to four years before being promoted to a scientist II. Alternatively, I could go back to school and, in the same time, obtain another degree and start a completely new career path. The latter option would give me many more opportunities, which appealed to me.

It is quite challenging to juggle both full-time work and law school. However, depending on your location within the United States, you may find many people in your area pursuing the same path, which could provide some support through the process. Your classmates can often be found in the patent law area, on the Hill [Capitol Hill], in other government positions, or as consultants. It’s important to note that law school doesn’t teach you how to be a lawyer; working in a law firm does.

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How has your Ph.D. helped you as an IP attorney?

Every day, we work on different technologies, are involved in cutting-edge research, and help our clients protect their innovative work. One significant area of IP law at the moment is the merging of artificial intelligence and bioscience research; I can pull from my Ph.D. research and create a foundation to better understand and communicate with our clients regarding their work. While we may reach the limit of our immediate knowledge regarding our clients’ work, we can still rely on the foundational principles learned as graduate students. I have some long-term clients whose work is precisely the same as my undergraduate research with liposomes and polymers, so that is spot-on with my scientific expertise domain.  My advisor is actually a client of mine. My Ph.D. has served me in taking technical information from the clients and distilling it down, which is a critical step during the Ph.D. degree process, as you will have to defend your dissertation and similarly break down an area of technical knowledge and make it easy to understand for someone in a different field.

Since finishing your J.D., what has your career path looked like so far?

I stayed with the law firm Sterne Kessler Goldstein & Fox after completing my role as a Technical Specialist for an additional three years, and then left for a smaller patent boutique, Fanelli Haag PLLC, where I had a role in helping the partners grow from three to twelve in size. From there, my current fellow co-partners and I left in 2016 to merge with previous colleagues from 2002 to start our current firm, Medler Ferro Woodhouse & Mills PLLC, where we focus solely on IP matters. We started this firm with six people and now have a team size of around 30. As a co-owner and manager of around twenty attorneys and ten staff members, I have helped grow the business and learned how to manage people and a law firm. Getting it successfully off the ground has had challenges but is also quite an adventure.

Can you walk me through your various positions since finishing law school?

After completing law school, I followed the typical progression from associate to senior associate and then partner, a goal typically achieved in six to eight years upon degree completion. The promotion from associate to partner causes the attorney to shift their focus from conducting existing business to bringing in new business. The transition to founding our firm was a bit non-traditional, but in the end, we decided to leave the current firm at the time as it was closing to start our current patent boutique. Co-founding a law firm was not necessarily a path I had envisioned for myself, but when both opportunities and situations present themselves, being adaptable and flexible is critical to making the most of them.

What is your favorite part of your current role?

My favorite part is still talking to scientists about their ideas. I am more on the business side with how their idea fits in with their company and how helping the scientist and their in-house counsel team create the desired strategy regarding the IP of the concept. It is neat to hear these cool technical ideas and help the creators protect their work.

What might a typical workday look like for you?   

While not always daily, we frequently talk with our clients, who are often in-house attorneys for companies representing their scientists. Some companies don’t have a legal team, so we might meet with their upper executive team members instead. Depending on our client’s needs, there is a variety of work that happens, such as writing a patent application for a new idea, determining what existing patents are in a particular sector so that clients wanting to break into this new area are aware of existing technologies; or buying technology, a company, or being bought themselves, for example. My current role puts much more emphasis on strategy and review than on writing in day-to-day activities.

The legal field is well known for its demanding work schedule. How do you find a balance between your personal and professional life?

When I first started, I was required to bill 1900 hours per year, which was right in the middle for most Big Law firms. When we began our current law firm, we consciously decided to drop that down to 1500 billable hours per year for our associates, which is relatively low for many comparable firms. By reducing billable hours, we hope to help our associates reduce burnout, which most of the founding partners had personally experienced. If our associates want to do more, they can and are rewarded with compensation for their additional work. This model works well as it allows associates to tailor their workload on a year-by-year basis to hit specific goals, such as buying a house or having more time for a vacation, if the minimum number of hours has been reached. Since our firm focuses solely on patent prosecution, writing patents for more than 2000 hours per year can be challenging, which is another reason we lowered the requirement.

What advice do you have for STEM Ph.D. students who are also interested in pursuing legal education or a career in the legal field?

More and more boutique law firms are emerging, focusing on niche topics that may be better suited for STEM Ph.D. holders and typically offer a better work-life balance than traditional Big Law firms. While Big Law is intense, the benefit is that you get a lot of great experience, even if you do it just for a few years. In my experience, some people are driven and determined to continue with law school after their Ph.D. and enter Big Law and do very well; Ph.D. or not, it is still a rite of passage and a lot of hard work, so be prepared!

What’s the best career advice you’ve received?

It is best if you take ownership of the tasks assigned to you. Regardless of the task or area in which it is, if you treat it as your own and care about it, it will work out for the best. If you treat it as something that needs to be checked off a to-do list and then do not care about it anymore, then it is not going to work out because you are not going to like it or care about it, and therefore, the end work product is going to be lacking and evident to others. If you find yourself unable to care about your work tasks, that might be a sign to consider a new career path, as you often care for and like similar things.

What is a favorite memory at Duke?

I went to basketball games with friends as an undergraduate and graduate student, either camping out for weeks as an undergrad or just for the weekend as a grad student. That experience is unique to a student body that is so invested in a sporting event and helps build a strong student community. Going to a basketball game after graduation is different from going while a Duke student or a college student in general.

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AUTHOR

Nicole Vijgen

Ph.D. student, Mechanical Engineering and Materials Science

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Nicole Vijgen is a first-year Ph.D. student in the Mechanical Engineering and Materials Science department. She works in Dr. Christine Payne’s laboratory, where she uses ML ensembles coupled with lab automation to study how protein and nanomaterial properties impact the formation of the protein corona. Prior to her graduate training at Duke University, Nicole received her bachelor’s degree in Plastics and Composites Engineering at Western Washington University. Afterward, she worked as a materials engineer at TE Connectivity as part of their Rotational Associates program. She is interested in the intersection between engineering and law and how integrating both fields can help shape products and policy that improve society.