W. Douglas Carothers, Jr. is Of Counsel with the law firm of North Weber & Baugh LLP. Mr. Carothers recently retired from startup, Infinera Corporation (NASDAQ INFN), in Sunnyvale, California in November, 2007 where he was Director of Intellectual Property and Chief Patent Counsel. He was previously Director of Legal Affairs and Intellectual Property for startup, SDL, Inc. which became a public company and then later was acquired by JDS Uniphase in February 2001. Before that, he created U.S. Patent Operations, and was Chief U.S. Patent Counsel, for the Seiko Epson Corporation of Japan. Prior to this experience, he was senior patent counsel for Xerox Corporation and was with Xerox for 15 years, mostly at its famed Palo Alto Research Center (PARC) in Palo Alto, California. Prior to this experience, he was a founder with his father of, and patent lawyer for, the patent law firm of Carothers & Carothers in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania specializing in patent, trademark law and unfair competition causes.

Doug received a B.S.E.E. degree from Purdue University in Electrical Engineering in 1959 and received a J.D. degree from Duquesne University School of Law in 1962.

Doug’s best expertise is patent application writing, although he has practice in all areas of intellectual property law for more than 45 years. His most experienced area of technology is in optical and electro-optical components and optical telecommunication systems.