© 2013 The Texas Lawbook.
By Brooks Igo
Staff Writer for The Texas Lawbook
Nicolas Barzoukas, who left Weil to be a partner in Baker Botts’ Houston office at the end of last month, said he wanted to join a growing practice at the home office of a Texas-based firm.
“The Baker Botts IP group has experienced incredible growth over the past five years in both size and capabilities,” he said. “This presents a great platform from which to grow my practice.”
Barzoukas, who focuses his practice on patent litigation in the pharmaceutical field, doesn’t expect his core practice to change much at Baker Botts, but he said he does see increased opportunities to represent local clients.
The University of Texas School of Law graduate was involved in Hatch-Waxman Act patent infringement cases protecting SINGULAIR(R) and FOSAMAX(R), both blockbuster drugs with over $1 billion in sales. He said those cases were particularly memorable because they were hotly contested and involved many interesting legal issues.
“Nic adds considerable depth to our patent litigation practice, particularly with respect to the pharmaceutical industry, which is consistently confronted with multiple and complex legal challenges to the products produced for consumers,” Baker Botts Managing Partner Andrew Baker said in a statement. “We are excited to have Nic join the firm and provide our clients dealing with these patent issues the type of high-level legal counsel expected of Baker Botts.”
Barzoukas said two upcoming issues he hopes will be addressed in the pharmaceutical industry in the next year are subject matter patentability issues under section 101 of the Patent Statute in the face of the recent Supreme Court decisions in Prometheus and Myriad and the ongoing evolution of the obviousness standards in connection with discovery of new chemical compounds.
In addition to his private practice, the new Baker Botts partner said he looks forward to continuing his pro bono efforts, which include collaborations with the Innocence Project and immigration matters.
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