Paul Keller: Defending Innovation in a Tech-Driven World

0:02 Hello and thank you for joining no Wrong Choices, the podcast that explores the career journeys of interesting and accomplished people in pursuit of great stories and actionable insights. I'm Larry Samuel, soon to be joined by my co-hosts, tushar Saxena and Larry Shea, but before we kick off, I have a very important request to make. Please support the work we're doing by following no Wrong Choices on your favorite podcast platform, such as Apple, spotify and YouTube, and by giving us a good review. We also ask that you connect with us on LinkedIn, facebook, instagram Threads and X, and by visiting our website at norongchoicescom, where you can learn more about us and the show while signing up to become a member of our community.

0:45 Your support enables us to bring these great stories to light. Now let's get started. This episode features the intellectual property trial lawyer, paul Keller. Paul is a super interesting guy who is keenly focused on technology and forward-looking ideas such as AI, self-driving cars and cities of the future. He's also the host of the podcast and Motion. Tushar, you brought Paul to us, so you have the responsibility of setting up this conversation for us. No problem. Paul and I went to school together, went to Fordham together many, many years ago, but we lost touch over the years. I've always known Paul went into the law. I obviously have friends who have known Paul for many, many years, and when we reconnected and we got to talking a little bit, I actually really got into what he's doing these days as an IP lawyer, and essentially what that means is that he is looking at a lot of like forward-thinking technology today, whether it be autonomous vehicles, and not just like your Tesla that you're driving, but things along the lines of like construction equipment or buses, or how you set up cities, and then, as you said a moment ago, ai as well, so like how these things will all essentially benefit our lives down the line.

2:00 It is fascinating when you just have a conversation to speak to them when we're not speaking to them as a group, and I can only imagine what this to him when we're not speaking to him as a group, and I can only imagine what this conversation will be like when we speak to him as a group. Yeah, this is our first lawyer, I think on the show, right, so but this is very unique. You know portion of the law that's not. You know your normal court drama et cetera. But I love lawyers in general. I find them fascinating. I think you're all going to find this conversation quite fascinating because of what Tushar just said it's about you know the future and patents, and you know things that you just you don't normally think about in your ideas to life, so it's going to be really interesting to hear how he does that.

2:47 So with that, here is Paul Keller. Paul, thank you so much for joining us. Pleasure is all mine. Thanks for having me. Okay. So once again, as we normally do on this show for a lot of our guests, full disclosure. Paul and I went to college together back at Fordham many, many moons ago and actually Paul and I kind of lost touch for many years after college and it's something I deeply regret. Paul and I were very fast friends in college. I really regret us losing touch. I'm so glad you're able to join us here and the fact that we have been able to even, you know, just kind of touch base here and there and just find out what's going on in our lives. I've been very excited about that. All right. So, paul, I know you're going to say oh, thank you, and all that stuff in just a second, but I also want to make sure I touch on this.

3:30 Years ago I ran into you on the street and I think you told me that you were a patent attorney at the time I was coming back from another gig. I kind of ran into you on the street and I said, hey, so what are you up to? And you said that you were a patent attorney. Now, what you didn't tell me is that you're actually in IP at Crowell and Mooring. So for our audience, what exactly is Paul Keller doing these days. Thanks for all that, tushar. That's a pretty big windup for me, so I really appreciate that. It's been great catching up with you as well, actually and the fact that we haven't caught up with each other is probably all my fault Well, absolutely, and the fact that we haven't caught up with each other is probably all my fault, so I probably was probably after you hit me. You threw me to the ground and I couldn't get up for a long time. I was like who the hell are you?

4:12 Nice, get a full. So I think, well, back then I can't remember exactly where I was in my legal career, but I've been a patent litigator my entire professional career. And so there is something different about being a patent lawyer and a patent litigator. For some inside baseball here is patent lawyers. We refer to them as the folks. These are the folks who go to the patent office and work with clients to negotiate the terms of the patent, kind of get the patent out of the patent office. It's called patent lawyering or patent prosecution. Sometimes that's called. So I, yeah, I do, I do. I do patent litigation, patent counseling, patent monetization strategies. I am a primarily that's what I do.

4:55 I could do the other IP rights as well. The trade secret rights is probably my next biggest bucket. Trademarks, copyrights Good rights is probably my next biggest bucket. Trademarks, copyrights, copyrights becoming even more important as the AI world evolves. But I have been doing that IT world work now for some number of years and it's been. How did I get into it? You know it's kind of a weird story actually. I went to, I'm just too sure you know, went to, went to undergrad at fordham. My majored in economics, almost minored in biology. You know that and that's my, for a lot of your listeners say oh well, he's a bio guy, he's a hard scientist, so that's probably why he got into the patent law.

5:41 But the biology I did was like the biology of beer and the chemistry of wine, so, so that was a totally, totally different thing. I like that kind of chemistry. It really worked out. It really worked out. And the Jesuits were on board with all that behavior. So it was fine. But I went to law school Cardozo Law School here in New York City. I really thought I was going to be a corporate guy. You know, one of the titans of the industry, the universe, the masters of the universe, that whole spiel. This is around Wall Street years, and so everybody. Real life Harvey Specter. That's who you were going to be. Well, no, no, that's a litigator. That's a litigator I was going to be. You know who I was going to be.

6:22 Whoever Martin Sheen played or Charlie Sheen played in Wall Street, the movie. I was going to be that Without going to jail and doing all the bad things that he did in the movie. But I wanted to do that kind of stuff. And. I have a sister. She's a tad older than I am. She also went to law school. She suggested out of nowhere Paul, we've got three years here to see what you want to do Sounds like corporate law is the way you're going to go. But on a whim, just find a course. Look through the course book Back then it was actually books and see if anything interests you in that catalog, in that curriculum. I looked through the book and copyright law caught my eye.

7:03 Professor Marcy Hamilton was teaching the course at the time at Cardozo. Your sister was going to Cardozo at the time. No, no, she was at Pace. She had finished up at Pace in White Plains, so I was in the city. But I took copyright law and really, really enjoyed it in a way that it was clearly going to change my life. And so I went on to do advanced copyright law. I did trademark, advanced trademark law. I actually never took patent law in law school that's just the whims of fate but ended up taking those experiences, getting very much involved with the school's arts and entertainment law journal, which you consider like the one right below the law review, became the editor in chief of the ALJ and then got a job in a very well-known patent litigation law firm in New York City.

7:53 It's since gone, but it was one of the titans of the industry at the time called Fish and Dave. I think that's where you threw me to the ground. That's probably where we met. That's probably when we kind of ran into each other. Yeah, I think that's right and I've never looked back. It's been a dream. You already mentioned you grew up in New York, so in and around that area. So what was a young Paul Keller dreaming about as a child? What was it originally going to be? Well, I had a pretty easy. So I grew up in the Catskill Mountains of New York State, born in Buffalo, lived in New Africa for a while, grew up in Monticello, new York, about two hours northwest of the city.

8:44 I knew at a very young age that law was going to be a thing for me. Back then in public school you had worked with like woodshop as a thing in fifth grade or you did some woodworking and I remember doing a print block when I was in fifth grade that said Paul Keller, he was an at-law or for-law, whatever it was. It was wrong Attorney at-law, that's what it said. It said PK at-law and it had the American flag on one side, the Capitol building on the other. And I really didn't know what lawyering meant back then, but I probably had a mouth on me already.

9:24 But I knew in fifth grade that I wanted to do law. I just knew that. So the challenge was OK one what is that? What am I going to do with it? I had no idea what I was going to do with the law and clearly no idea what it was going to take from fifth grade through college to get me there. And I kind of figured that out along the way through college to get me there and I kind of figured that out along the way. But I was blessed with knowing at fifth grade that the law was going to be in my future. So, paul, beyond Woodshop and getting the vision and creating the nameplate and everything else, who was Paul Keller Meaning? Were you driven? Were you ambitious? Were you a big personality? What were? some of other big character traits you had that kind of pushed you out of this path.

10:09 It evolved. It evolved to be sure. I mean when I was in elementary school. I was, I was a very normal kid. I ran and I jumped and I played and I biked and I swam and all that normal stuff. There wasn't really much to me. Middle school was very much the same. I think around middle school was the time learning a lot from my sister really. She was very active in the high school debate team when I was in middle school and so I got a chance of seeing that and kind of getting excited about that a little bit and kind of getting excited about that a little bit. And so when I got to high school, when I had been exposed to that a lot, so saw what many people don't even recognize that happens in their high schools is their debate team and what's called the National Forensics League.

10:58 You know, for many families who don't participate in that debate is kind of this dark arts that are happening behind closed doors that nobody really understands, or it's a club, it's like a chess club or something. Even the chess clubs when they go on a national, you know, normal other people who are not involved have no real clue about the rigors of what happens there. And the debate team in Monticello High School was a nationally ranked organization. It was the most highly funded club in the school, far surpassing any sports team when I got to high school. I knew I was going to be a part of the debate team. That probably polished off the public speaking, gave me confidence to stand up in front of people, made me confident to speak my mind in front of a large group of people.

11:52 Learned very early on that I might not be right when I'm saying in front of these people, but, boy, I better say it in a way that makes them think I'm certain. And that went a long way to people back then. Maybe still does. But that went on to my sophomore year where I began to develop some of those leadership skills leading to me becoming the president of the student body. Year to senior year, meeting very active with the community, very active with school, school clubs, very active in sports. And so it was with that rather exhausting four years where Tushar got to meet me as a freshman at Fordham and he's like you know.

12:38 I was completely exhausted and took, took a little bit of time off really at Fordham to kind of recuperate. But it, it, it, it was. That was foundational, it was very foundational. All of that was very foundational your parents. What did they do for them? Because I mean the idea of you saying that as a child well, I'm going to be a lawyer, like you know I had said the same thing as a kid, and that was only because most of the men on my father's side of the family are in law of some sort right. So for me it was. It was like okay, this is the family business, we go into law. What about you? What about your parents? Yeah, I didn't have that experience. So my mom was a kindergarten teacher, public school teacher. My father was also in education, turned to the library, sciences, and did more on the college side, a university side, of librarians.

13:22 My grandfather, who passed away when I was very young this is my mom's father. He was a lawyer but didn't really practice. He was very much involved in business and so he ran a number of car dealerships. He actually started a free radio stations one of them, which is now the student radio station in Syracuse, new York. Uh, so lawyering was not around, it was like inundated, like well, this is the family business, I just need to go. In fact, if I had to follow in the family business, it probably would have been teaching on both sides of our family, or teachers, teachers all the way back. So I don't know if it was LA law back then. I'm not, I don't know, I really don't know.

14:02 There was a, there was some politics. You know, I thought about that for a second. Um that, that. I got turned off to that I'm not really sure how and when that happened, but it was more just me thinking this feels right. Did you like the argument? Did you like to present a case and like just see it through and argue, or is it just bring people to your side? What was the exact appeal? It's a great question. Back then I actually think it was probably. It wasn't so much just the arguing for arguing's sake, it was more of the entertainment value of what was happening here. I really enjoyed getting up in front of people and talking to them, certainly with my student body president and the clubs I was involved with.

14:52 We had goals, we had fundraising goals, we had membership goals, we had things we wanted to do in the school and I really enjoyed talking to people and inspiring them, or hoping to inspire them to kind of come with me on this journey. Let's get from point A to point B together. We can do it together. We're going to have fun doing it together. We're doing it. It's going to be serious. It can be serious stuff that happens. We're going to laugh along the way. I really, really, really really enjoyed it and that was the high school version of you. That was the high school version of me, that continues to today and that helps me in the law. I think I'm sure there are plenty, and New York litigators have a certain reputation around the world and I can fill that mold, live up to that expectation at the drop of a hat, no question.

15:49 And that's an unfortunate part of our business where the tenacious, down-in-the-dirt bulldog approach sometimes is required to help parties resolve their disputes, and that's just an unfortunate reality of it. But many other times the business solutions, the we can figure this out. Whatever else is driving the dispute, can be resolved. Well, yes, using the legal process does not require scorched earth and boiled ocean all the time, and so I bring a lot of that. You know, let's, let's march to a particular, let's march in a certain direction.

16:32 I'll, I'll, my client will get there first, but over the course of the case, your client's going to get there too, cause, frankly, the arguments and the facts and the theatrics of it all is just your guy's going to lose. I mean to that end you're bringing it up now, so let's just go there. I mean, one of my real questions is you know, is it better to resolve it and come to the table and figure it out before you get to litigation, Because then it's kind of taken out of your hands a little bit. It's like, well, you know, I only I had some all the control before, or 50% of it, and now you're giving some of that up to litigation processes. Do you want to solve it before you get there?

17:13 As a New York litigator. The answer, of course, is that's completely wrong. You always want to fight. Of course that's right. I mean, with IP litigation, patent litigation, straight secret litigation, you are normally dealing with very sophisticated players who have businesses to run, who are fighting tooth and nail for market share and for recognition in their industry, and so to have litigation as a rather significant time and money distraction 99% of the time doesn't really help them. And you're there because the parties just haven't figured out a way through the problem that the path towards amicable resolution sometimes is very tricky and requires the hard hand of a Keller to come in and say no, no, you really need to talk, you really need to come and let's figure this business solution out, and that's you know.

18:18 I've enjoyed that in many ways, but it's just the. It's a reality of American business. It really is. You know, larry took us down a rabbit hole and I'm going to keep us there for one more moment. So you know, I've been a business person for a very long time and seen a lot of different things along the way, one of which is litigation and patents and things of that nature, and it seems like the big company always has a massive advantage over the small company that is trying to break into a new space. So, you know, as an attorney, how do you support the small business that's trying to break through, that doesn't have the funds and the resources to keep up with the Goliath who can wait out a process, so to speak?

19:07 Yeah, there are actually a couple facets to your question, and I think you're probably focused on one of them a lot more than the others and I'll talk about, I think, what you're talking about and then I'll scratch the surface of the other and see if you're interested in that too. But yes, certainly a well-funded, well-seasoned player versus the opposite of that will have a number of great advantages as they move forward in this. They're better prepared, they know about the distractions to come. They've got the money to do this and all of that to come.

19:47 They've got the money to do this and all of that, and so it is a challenge for a newbie when they get sued or feel like they need to sue. There's a lot of trepidation that takes place there. The system itself, the patent law system, is rather well balanced in most places around the United States. There are some jurisdictions that people argue are more patent friendly for particular reasons than others, and vice versa in some other instances. But the law itself is rather well-balanced of trying to protect the innovators for what they've innovated and the alleged infringers. That we're not just accusing infringers because it's fun and we can easily capture people who are actually not infringing that system is rather well-balanced, got it.

20:28 So the law is well-balanced. And then the question becomes OK, the resources and mentality, and the reality is today, maybe more than ever before, one. It's wild, it is very expensive. It is very expensive to pursue patent litigation in the United States. Strategic litigation in the United States Very expensive to pursue patent litigation in the United States, strategic litigation in the United States very expensive. But there is a rather robust, there's a contingency industry that's available in the United States and there's also litigation funding that's available in the United States and clients and their lawyers discuss the benefits and the pros and cons of those other approaches and decide what makes sense for them. And in some instances the little guy says I don't want to sue because all the other distractions are too much.

21:10 But those opportunities exist more than ever before that help smaller, less funded companies kind of do what they think it needs to be done for the larger companies, and that's it. But that's, I think, where your question was really going. That companies, and that's it. That's, I think, where your question was really going. That's super. That's exactly what I was asking. That's super helpful, well there's another part of that which is and you've seen a little bit of this in the news over the last couple decades half a decade, decade maybe is this concept of efficient infringement. Now, larger companies will proceed to infringe other parties' patent rights and will do so because the likely profit that they will earn it's almost like bean counting the likely profit that they will earn from the infringement, combined with the risk of litigation and risk of loss, is greater than what the likely outcome of the case will be.

22:07 And so that has been discussed now in the industry for some time. There's been a lot of articles on it, trying to assess that, and companies will play that game as best they can or pursue that strategy as best they can. I've got some thoughts on that on both sides, but that is an issue that our industry, the patent infringement industry, needs to continue to think about. All right, so let me. I don't want to continue down this, but I do kind of want to ask for an example, and then one that will, and then one, obviously, that won't infringe upon something that you're working on, but this notion of what you had just spoken about a moment ago, the idea of infringement of patents.

22:49 Give me an example of something like that that we might recognize, like the news, or something like that. Oh well, I mean, there's plenty of battles that have been in the news about this. You've heard about the Apple versus Samsung phone fights. Like, for example. That's one example, but there are thousands and thousands of thousands of patents out there. But patents are for most people. They think of it in terms of technology. They think of their computers, the mobile phones, gps systems, pharmaceuticals these technologies and innovations that the inventors, the innovators believe they're entitled to, what is a government-granted monopoly Right and that is called a patent, and it's all around the world.

23:34 They're geographic in scope, so a US patent only protects things that happen, and there's some exceptions to this, but they're US quarantine. Sure, and an Italian patent will be an Italian quarantine, but that's what we're talking about. And when you infringe these things, a patent is a long document. Usually it's got a lot of technical information in it and it ends with what are called claims, and I think that's an unfortunate name for what they're called, because people talk about claiming this and making claims and kind of like allegations I claim that you committed a tort against me, those kinds of things. These claims and a patent are actually kind of like the property line for your home.

24:16 They're the meets and bounds of your property line and if you are found to have crossed over what is maybe public into your, the needs and balance of your property you are can be found infringing the patent, and all these bad things can happen as a result. All right. So okay, let's get away from the hardcore talk here a little bit, okay, so your time now, when I finally meet you. Let's go to when I met you in Fordham. All right, in our freshman year and whatnot. Let's go to when I met you in Fordham, our freshman year and whatnot. Obviously, you took some time off from wanting to be in student government and maybe doing some of the debate club, although I think you did do debate in Fordham, didn't you? I did not, actually I did not do debate. So you're absolutely right.

24:57 In terms of my freshman year, I took a breath from all the stuff that was happening in high school and it began to again ramp up as I got to senior year, where I was not involved in the debate. I did do a lot of model United Nations, that's it. And then I did the if you recall some of our friends Artie, the One-Man Party and another group. They put together a student court. That was the other okay yes, that was the other thing I thought you guys were doofuses for doing that, but yes, nice. When you say doofus, I mean you say kind of not in the way I would say doofus, I say you were such doofuses, meaning that was really cool and you're doing some pretty interesting stuff, that's how I take that.

25:41 No, I mean it, as you guys were doofuses, as Tushar was playing the trombone in the corner. I think it was only the mouth you guys knew that he was practicing on, but it was that got very serious at the end of my college career is doing those two things. That was a lot of fun. So you continue to basically want to build an argument throughout college. I mean, obviously you're going to be a lawyer. You knew you were going to be a lawyer. So the idea of even taking a break for a little bit was simply to give yourself a little bit of room to once again just build the argument, so to speak. Well, it wasn't. I have found personally that I tend to gravitate towards trying to help people solve their problems.

26:31 You see people struggle leading an organization, or you see people struggle and they're being encountered with a challenge from administration, from a teacher, from another student, from parents, whoever it might be, from an adversary, some adversary, and they're struggling with solving that problem. They're struggling with standing up for themselves and figuring out how to resolve and how to address it. And, for whatever reason whatever DNA glitch that took place, the drop on the head, whatever happened there, where I don't seem to be wrapped up in. I'm very comfortable in standing up, I'm very comfortable in speaking, I'm very comfortable in sometimes putting people at ease.

27:16 That does not scare me at all. And so I found myself kind of just naturally gravitating or being put in positions where I got to do all that and I can't seem to escape that and really don't want to. That's excellent. So that's perfect segue. To bring us back to that exercise that your sister gave you, because now you're really trying to like fine tune and hone in on exactly what it is that you want to accomplish in this field. So relive that exercise with us, because that was a really valuable tool that she has you looking through a book and really deciding, like what strikes a chord. Yeah, it was life changing. It was life changing and I think it was very wise words and just the approach of thumbing through the catalog and reading through some things.

28:05 And I like to think that I didn't settle on copyright because it was so early in the alphabet and the curricula there that I didn't get to do hands around but it sounded really interesting and it was really at that time. It was focusing a lot on music rights. There was a lot of parody work that was going on back then in the music world and Napster was, you know kind of not even a thing yet, but there were whispers about it. The internet was still, you know kind of still percolating around, but it was whatever it was. It struck a chord. It seemed different than you know kind of I don't mean to belittle it, but a kind of humdrum contract law where the rules are relatively well known.

28:47 Copyright law felt like it was still very much moving and evolving and changing and I was going to learn about that. And that was very exciting to me and proved to be such. I mean, these are rights that are in our Constitution. You don't, you don't, you don't go to the, to the Constitution and think about contract. That's not there. But you do have copyright and copyright that was specifically delineated in our Constitution and there was something about all of that. So you know, I've got to check this out and really enjoyed it. But Marcy Hamilton, if you ever listen to this, a true inspiration, a great professor at Cardozo Couldn't have made it more enjoyable for me to learn that subject from her and with my colleagues there at Cardozo, and I couldn't stop learning about it.

29:33 And patent law I didn't take only because the course wasn't offered as often as I needed to. I didn't realize I was going to take patent law, or needed to take patent law, until in my third year and by then the rotation of patent law had passed me by, so I didn't get a chance to take it. But when people ask me and I can start up, you can ask me another question. But people ask me, like what advice do you have for me? Fordham I'm on the board of visitors at Fordham and there's a pre-law program at Fordham, as I'm sure a lot of graduate schools have them too, and they bring people in from industry to talk to the students there to give them advice.

30:13 Um, and god help them. They've invited me over a couple times to share my words, and so one thing I have told them is just like I did, you got to trust your gut sometimes, regardless of the regardless of what people are telling you, regardless of the brand name of this or that, regardless of what people are telling you, regardless of the brand name of this or that, regardless of this course that you had so set in stone for yourself. You might meet someone, you might find a mentor, something might spark your interest. It is too long a career for you not to act on it. I mean, there's a reason why it said the practice of law. You're practicing it every day, you're practicing it throughout your career and if you're practicing something you're not passionate about, it's going to be very challenging. I was horrified when some of my colleagues from law school they would go to a very well-known firm.

30:58 They could pay a lot of money, but they weren't passionate about it. Three or four years later, they're out. That's really horrifying, that's sad, and I don't want that to happen. So that's it. There's the way I'm done. That's it. That's all my wisdom. That's all I can offer you. I'm just going to take a nap now. I'm done. It's a good show everybody. Have a good night. That's how we typically end, but that's good. You know, Paul, I'm curious about, like, we had a heart transplant surgeon on last season and the process that he went through to learn that skill and that craft and to become one of the best of the best at one of the hardest things on earth was pretty intense and pretty mind-blowing.

31:41 And you know, as we're talking, I'm wondering about the day-to-day of a college student, without, you know, going too deep in, Like what's the intensity level of law school for a student? It's pretty intense. You know. You've heard I'm sure you've heard this adage by others, I don't know how many lawyers you've had on this program but the old adage of the first year, they scare you to death. The second year they work you to death. And the third year they scare you to death. The second year they work you to death. And the third year they bore you to death. And there's, you know, in very rough ways. That's somewhat accurate. But I remember, you know, I was not working law school. I had all the government loans I could possibly load up on, so I was able to focus on school and I it was from my apartment on roosevelt island the first year to school library and back.

32:33 There was not a lot of fun time. I knew that going in, I knew that it was going to be intense, and so the fact that it was intense didn't really surprise me. But I think, think for others, they were a little shocked. They were like Whoa, this is not like undergrad anymore. But even with that intensity kind of with that known acknowledged intensity, with all that it was going to take I failed my property midterm exam. I started my first year and I knew it immediately. I, I, I left that exam. Maybe it was October of that first year and I knew it immediately. I left that exam. Maybe it was October of that first year and I walked out of that exam and walked into the stairwell of Cardozo Law School and broke into tears.

33:19 Wow, I can't play up to this in this public setting, but I was shattered that I had, with all the things that I had accomplished and all the work that I had done, that I was so not prepared for that test that it just shook me to my core. And so that was on a Friday. I think it was a Friday or Thursday. It was very close to the weekend. So I had the weekend to kind of collect myself weekend. So I had the weekend to kind of collect myself. And I remember very early the next week taking all of that off and saying, okay, kiddo, I mean you got to pick yourself up now. And I approached each of my classes in a very, very different way, graduating the top 15% of the class, being the editor of the Arts, and Came to be the editor and chief of ALJ, the arts and entertainment law journal.

34:08 But it took that moment to wake me up to the reality that you know, you think you're studying in a sense way no, no, no, this, this is what he's at Was that the first test you'd ever failed, no, no, no, well, certainly not. I failed. No, no, no, I'm uh. Well, certainly not I'm not talking about like you know, like when we're back in grade school. You know we screwed up on the times tables here I mean like a legitimate test in high school slash, slash, high school, high school no, I mean no, I was. you know, we were all overachievers, right, so we're, all you know, got the 3.5 or above and all the blah, blah, blah and he went to college. Now, I didn't, I didn't graduate with with 3.5 or above from Fordham.

34:52 I think some of my my taking it easy the first and second year maybe caught up with me a little bit, but I, you know it was with honors and I appreciated that. But it did not prepare me for, so no, the answer is no. Yeah, I did not prepare me for, so no, the answer is no. I did not fail any exams in high school that I recall. I don't remember. I certainly didn't fail any in college and that's great, but I needed that failure in law school to put some to kick my butt to get me up where I needed to go, and it worked and Stuart Sturck was that professor needed to go and it worked. Oh, and Stuart Sturck was that professor of property and he's going to listen to this and he's going to smile because he's like, yeah, I remember, I remember.

35:33 Kelly. So, paul, during your time in law school, did you intern at a law firm as well? Did you at least get an idea of what it meant to work in a law firm? I did not. I did not so my experience with Cardozo. Taking a step back here, I'll give you a little bit of a wind-up on my experience with Cardozo. So I was applying to a variety of law schools in the New York City area, far north of Syracuse to St John. I didn't leave the New York State area and I'm from Fordham, of course, but I visited Cardozo Interviewing was a thing back then that we'd do, and I interviewed with the admissions director at Cardozo and we had a great time.

36:20 There was no question we were enjoying each other's company. But she at the end of it, said would you like to meet the dean of the law school? And I, of course, being as sarcastic as I could be back then, said no, no, why would I ever want to do that? Of course I want to meet the dean of the law school. Are you kidding? What a great opportunity, Absolutely. When can I do that? Well, his office is right across the hall. I'll let you step in. I'll let you wait for a while while I go get them. So this is Yeshiva University's law school. I grew up in the porch belt of Casco Mountains. I'm very familiar with that environment and I'm certainly very different from the Jesuit environment at Fordham. But I go into the dean's law school and there is a crucifix on the wall that's bigger than me.

37:05 There are Paul Cezanne books all over the place. I am back at Father O'Hare's office at Fordham in a way I couldn't imagine what is going on and in comes a gentleman who I came to know as being Frank Macchiarola, who was big in New York City politics back in the day. He was the dean of the law school at the time and very much a Roman Catholic, but he knew about the Fordham traditions. He was explaining to me and walking me through the Achieva traditions and how frankly similar they were. And we really hit it off, the two of us, and we started negotiating my financial package in that meeting and before I left, I had negotiated on the deal to go to Cardona.

37:53 This is Paul Keller to a T right here. That's a heck of a meeting. I had a great time with him, but I also worked with him both summers. He was an administrative law judge. He probably was an with him both summers. So he was, uh, uh, he was, I wouldn't say administrative law judge. It probably wasn't ALJ, uh, both summers, and so I worked with him to deal with some of the cases that he was handling over the course of the summers. Um, some of that was not even as I probably didn't. I just wasn't as aware of what should, what one should, do during the summers, uh, and so so when he he offered very early to help him out and he was offering good money and I just took it and I just absolutely took it. So I didn't summer anywhere and it was. I've got another good story for you about how I got my first job.

38:37 But when I did get offered my first job, it was actually between Fish and Neve and being an Air Force Judge. Advocate General for the Air Force. You're going to be a JAG. I was going to be a JAG Of all things, and the JAG opportunity was really one that I wanted to try a lot of cases. I wanted to use that process, get a military background for all the things that that offers. What are all the doors that that? opens up and try cases and I found out the first opportunity I was going to have with the Jag was not going to be trial-based and Fish and Eve came through with their offer and I really enjoyed that experience and the interviews with them and the people there, and so I chose Fish and Eve.

39:25 And what is the life of a person who has just joined that firm, and do you get to see your friends for the next several years afterwards? I did, I certainly did, I certainly did. I was thrilled to be at the firm. I was very lucky to be there, it was a series of very weird coincidences that got me there. I took it as just like I took. I knew law school. I knew law school. I knew, going into law school, that it was going to be incredibly challenging and a lot of time devoted to it. And I knew that a hundred percent when I went to the law firm. And so I dedicated myself and, having never taken patent law, you know rather concerned that I'm going to go to this patent boutique firm as my first step in my career and so new. I had to hunker down and really apply all my post-failing midterm learnings to Fish and.

40:12 Eve and did that. And it was at that point. It was, you know, fish and Eve was probably one of just a few of the pillars of the patent bond at the time, late 90s very well-known, magnificent lawyers and what a phenomenal training ground for young pups like me, and so, yeah, we worked hard, but it wasn't like you hear or you see in the movies. Where it's you know, they've never seen the light of day, they're always in a warehouse somewhere and it's completely shattered. I do believe you weren't enough efficient. I've heard some of that in other firms which is great, it is great. It was great. It was a great place to learn the practice of law.

40:55 Do you remember the first big or meaningful case that you were attached to? Yes, and did it change anybody's life for the better or not? No, no, I absolutely can't. I absolutely can't, I absolutely can't. I absolutely can't. I was a second-year associate by that time. I had figured out how to turn the damn computer on and start writing sentences with nouns and verbs In a way they wanted me to. But it was a case called Biogen versus Burleks. Biogen is down on his Biogen IDEC, but Burleks, I think, is still out. I Biogen is now known as Biogen IDEC, but then Burleks, I think, is still out. I haven't kept track of that, but it was a case involving the expression of a protein called interferon beta for a multiple sclerosis drug, and Biogen's drug was called Avonex.

41:40 I forgot the Burleks product, but burleks was suing um. At least burleks was suing our client. And so there was um. I remember this so well because the the senior associate, the partner that were involved in that case were, were phenomenal teachers in such a way they were. They allowed me over the course of the case to do things that second-year associates just don't typically get to do. And one of them is something called a deposition. I don't know if you know what that? is, but it's where you sit a witness down. You've probably seen it on TV and stuff, but it's where you sit a witness down and you swear them in and you ask them questions as if you were in court, and the whole point of that is to learn about the case, test your theories, but also to have that written record so when you get to court you can use that document if necessary.

42:29 And here I am, as a second year associate, sitting down with the head of marketing for Burleks to talk about some of the damages issues in the case and get this valuable information over a product that was hundreds of millions of dollars of value for both sides, and I was terrified about all this. You're 27 or 28 at the time. Physically that many times around the sun. But really at that point I think I'm like 15 years old, I have no business, and I literally started making up words. During the course of the deposition I had a friend of ours. Well, there was a partner at the firm who was actually from my own hometown, had no involvement in me getting hired, but knew me and my family very well, and he was a rather large man.

43:18 So he would whisper, or try to whisper, to me to ask me an appropriate question. But of course he was so significant that he couldn't actually lean over to me. So he would just say the question and at one point I'm just looking at him. Clearly the witnesses heard the question from him and I just said can you just answer his question? Can we just not? Quick to answer his question Boogie dance yeah, come on, just answer his question. No-transcript changes their lives.

44:04 You are never the same person after that experience, and it's not. It's exponentially different. After that, as a litigator, having gone through your first deposition, the industry now knows okay, somebody has said you're good enough to take a deposition, and so you're going to get your second and your third, and there's still a lot of firsts. There's the first inventor, there's the first expert, there's the first. You know this and that. But my career took off after that first deposition, just regardless of how badly, I did it. A couple of questions on that One. The first question will be okay. So how long were you over at Fish and Neve for?

44:45 Almost eight years seven and a half eight years they merged with a firm called Ropes and Gray and by then the very well-known Boston firm, and so by then a lot of my mentors had left for a variety of reasons, and so I moved over a firm called WilmerHill. When you do depositions, obviously you are speaking to people of many different levels, whether it be the head of marketing, someone research, someone in tech, etc. How much of how much of your knowledge, how much, let's say, extra knowledge, do you then have to gain along the way? Meaning, obviously you know the law, but if you're going to speak to someone about marketing or about specific tech, patents or or anything of that level, how much extra knowledge do you need to bring to the table?

45:29 Do you need to become a quasi-expert in whatever area of tech you're talking about, whatever area of bio you're talking about? Absolutely. You absolutely need to do that. The depositions usually happen as the case progresses. You file the complaint, and the meat of a case, of an IP case, is what we call discovery. It's where both sides are trying to figure out what's happening on the other side, and the vast majority of that on the front end of that is the exchange of documents Right, and so you fight about all the documents, making sure all the right documents have been produced, and then you review the documents, and after you've reviewed the documents, that's when the depositions usually begin to take place. So they happen to be at the end of fact discovery, or generally towards the back end of the fact discovery, and so you need to spend time with the documents.

46:20 If it's a patent case, of course, the patent you need to spend time, potentially with your experts, understanding what the issues are. Where are we going with this? What are the themes, what are the theories, how are the facts lining up with all of that, and so, when you get to the deposition, you have theories you're going to test. You have a pretty good sense of what their theories are. You're going to test them, and a good part of the deposition, though, continues to be good, old-fashioned discovery. I've seen the document. I see it says one, two, three, but can you tell me about one, was one really, how it went, and was there some gaps there that I don't know about? You're very much filling in a story, almost like coloring my numbers, and so the better lawyers will look at depositions and say I don't even know the numbers and I certainly don't know how many colors there are.

47:05 So I am here to try to paint as a fulfilled, complete picture within the time allowed as I can, to understand what the situation was and how I might use that to bolster my theories and take down their own your current field, which is more ip, uh, ip, uh, uh, patent, uh, patent, uh. Litigation, which is, you know, the notion of the cutting edge stuff that you're doing here. What was it that really, then, attracted you to this portion, or did you just make that natural move to it? Well it's. I mean there are. I mean certainly at Fish and Eve. I could have done more trademark work, more copyright work, but I really liked the patent side a lot more, and even more than now than ever.

47:51 What attracted you to that side? You know the technology stuff. You know you call me a doofus. I call it, you know, maybe a closet geek, but I'll be cat. I mean, I get very excited. No, for that you're not a doofus, for that you're a nerd, but nerd with a good meaning. Well, I'll embrace it wholeheartedly. I mean, I really enjoy learning about how our world works, about how our devices work, how our technology works, how systems, processes work, how pharmaceuticals work. What's happening next? How are we going to take this to the next level? I love all of that stuff, and so to be able to speak with people that have spent their entire professional lives focusing on that one improvement, and I get to speak to all of these different people all the time throughout my career.

48:37 I mean it's really very exciting for me to be able to do that. And so. I've spent a lot of time in the transportation side of things, but I have been exposed to a lot of other stuff and so it's been, and some of them are really simple. Some of them are the carpet tiles that your chair might be rolling on right now. The press white strips was another fun case for me. Medical device stuff I've done a lot of that. Certainly the small molecule life science stuff. But to be able to rub elbows with these industry titans and it's it's hard not to pass that up or not to pass that. Yeah, I'm glad you're talking about that aspect of it because I really want to know how often you have to, you know, hire somebody outside of the case because you just need to learn about X, y or Z.

49:24 I mean, you're saying you're rubbing elbows with people and that's how you can get those answers, but are they all involved with the case? Do you go outside of the case to get answers? The law is one thing, like Tushar is saying, but figuring out the tech aspect of it, whether it is tiles or AI, has to be quite a bit of work. I would imagine yeah, nobody can know everything, right, right. Absolutely right. So the answer to your question is you absolutely go outside the case, but that's not unusual. So in every single patent case I've ever been involved with, and every professional I've ever been involved with, there are experts that are hired for the purposes of that case by both sides. Sometimes it's one, sometimes it's two, sometimes it's many more.

50:06 Sometimes it's one, sometimes it's two, sometimes it's many more. But these experts are hired primarily, or at least initially they're hired for the possibility that they'll be testifying in trial on their client's behalf, and so you get those kinds of experts. But you also have non-testifying experts who are there to kind of talk the questions through and test the theories and figure out their information, and those are important roles that those experts play in making sure that what you want to say is technically accurate and is true. But the clients also are experts in the field. I mean the inventors are at the client potentially, or the innovators are at the client and they have a lot of colleagues there, they have departments there and so they are a massive resource also to be able to teach you what the science looks like, what came before, what was the aha moment, and all of that to better understand where this is in the space.

50:59 There's also a document. It's a really helpful document. It's the patent itself that is meant to describe things for the public. It might be the industry in which the technology sits, but it's meant for that industry to read and understand what the patent is, and so that helps you understand what the technology is. That patent identifies other materials that came before it as relevant to the technology. You can look at those and at bottom you kind of learn from the previous case and you take the previous case information and you bring it to the next case and you bring it back to the next case. So over time you amass this amount of knowledge that you kind of roll up to the next case. That helps you learn, or know first and learn how to ask the right questions moving forward.

51:43 So all that's part of the mismatch that happens. So all that's part of the mismanagement that happens With the type of work that you do. You are at the forefront of many different types of movements from a technology standpoint. You're involved with the future of cities, ai, self-driving cars. I mean the type of work that you're touching. What do you find most compelling right now in terms of where we're headed? I don't want to say as a society, but what are some of those technologies and breakthroughs that you see coming in the near term? In the near term. The shift from internal combustion engines to electrical vehicles is a huge shift that's taking place in the car industry.

52:33 That's one no-transcript, it's not number two, but another one that's just incredibly interesting and scary to many, many people and should scare us in some ways, but also is just a wonderful addition to our technological storehouse. So I'm excited about that. You know, as we talk more about the cities and all these things kind of begin to interrelate how AI helps cars, the developer of cars, developer of energy. The management of energy, the developer of batteries, the mining industry and the finding of where these minerals should be.

53:16 Where do we find these minerals and how do we harvest them from the earth? Ai is touching on all of that and, as you kind of, I like to think of things as cities, because as you look through the home of the individual and that experience all the way through, you know getting the person to work and back again, all the water that's required, electricity is required, parks that are required, shopping is required and all that that kind of fits within a city and makes it easier to talk about and digest. But we're changing, as a species, the way we're thinking about our, our, our communities. And some of those communities are easier to develop because they're on open land and some of our traditional cities are are trying to figure out how to kind of quote-unquote, retrofitfit themselves to take on these technologies as quickly as they can, realizing that they've already got infrastructure and it's hard to build on top of it sometimes.

54:13 But the cities that are literally the cities of tomorrow you hear about Neom and Saudi Arabia, these really interesting cities in Tokyo, egypt, malaysia just fascinating approach. In China, lots and lots of things happening in China, malaysia, just fascinating approach in China, lots and lots of things happening in China. These cities are kind of next-gen thinking, not only the application of technologies but how we interact with each other as a community, and that is wildly exciting, I think, for all of us and it'll impact us, I think, in a very positive way in many, many respects. But also, in a way, there's kind of the dark side of all this change and we need to manage how it will impact jobs.

54:56 And how do we manage those people that are now in a traditional, I see, kind of an internal combustion engine job, realizing that that industry is going to change pretty dramatically? The trucking industry is under tremendous stress. Largest employer in the United States, if not the world, the trucking industry is under tremendous stress. Largest employer in the United States, if not the world, is the trucking industry. And they've got a huge demand problem. They don't have enough people to drive their vehicles. And so what about doing first mile, last mile or some self-driving or drive-by-wire approach to these things? That solve a lot of problems, but it could also put a lot of people at work, a lot of people. And so how do we manage that as a society? How do our policymakers think about those issues? That's not an IP issue, but it's integrated.

55:39 It's very interrelated to what IP is meant to do, and so what innovations will be brought to bear to be able to manage all of those problems. Well, you can see I'm beginning to kick out on this. I get very excited about these problems. A couple of questions, a quick one and then probably a little longer one for you to answer. First one is are you seeing technology now on the patent level from some of your clients that most of us won't see for the next five to 10 years? No, Just because the patent is in the patent level from some of your clients that most of us won't see for the next five to 10 years. No, just because the patent is in the patent office right now doesn't mean that the technology is not going to be deployed. So people are inventing things right now and deploying it right now in parallel filing for patents.

56:22 There are some things that might take a little longer because the R&D cycle takes longer, but that has nothing to do with their patented system. It's just that R&D takes time. Okay, Second, you mentioned that Fish Neve was a boutique firm, correct, yes, sir, and that Crowell Mooring is a large firm. It's a true large firm. Well, we would characterize that as boutique, is kind of one practice area, right? And Crowell Mooring is a multi-practice area firm. So which do you think is better in terms of, let's say, the overall career path Going the boutique route or a multi-route? As you are now currently in your position, Is there an advantage or disadvantage between the two?

57:08 There are definitely pluses and minuses between the two. I think there was a time when I first started that the boutique, the patent boutique firms there were many of them. Patent law was not very well known back then. I don't think the industry generally understood how much money was being made in that industry. The geeks, as we were called, you just leave them off in the corner. That's not the type of law I ever want to practice, and so we were pretty much left alone Over the course of time, and it was really driven by some of the economics of the larger firms who began to hire some of the best and brightest in their industry. They learn about what that industry, what the patent litigation industry looks like, and got very interested in getting in the game and applying their trial litigation skills to the patent litigation space.

57:59 And so they got in the game as a business proposition. It became almost impossible for a boutique firm to continue on in large cities, large regions where a lot of law takes place. So in New York City it's hard to be a boutique patent firm, for example. It might be easier in a different community where different things are happening in that region, certainly in what you call the law hubs of the United States. It's very challenging to be a boutique firm community where there's different things are happening in that region, certainly in the what you call the law hubs of the United States. Very challenging to be fatigued from. The benefit of it, of course, is all of you are speaking the same language. You're all focused on that area, you're all focused on that business plan.

58:40 You're all focused, maybe, on those set of clients and their technological needs and you're you're able to bounce ideas off of each other and create business development campaigns and it's all one big happy family and that's great and there's a lot to be said for that. That's the environment I grew up in and I really learned a lot in a very short period of time. The GP firms though one, you can still have a lot of patent people around, a lot of IP people around, so you can kind of continue on that communal experience. But you can also learn from other practice areas and I think there's a lot to be said for that. One but two, there's a lot of cycles in the law.

59:24 This year might be a big corporate year. Well, the next year might be a big product liability litigation. You know there's a lot of ups and downs in the different practice areas of the law and so if you have a lot of different practice areas, law firms can kind of take those ebbs and flows and even them out, and that of course financially takes a lot of pressure off the individual lawyers. Or if you're in a boutique firm, if that industry is down, oh boy, there's a lot of stress in that firm. Okay, Real quick. Best part of being a lawyer, worst part of being a lawyer, Because I can tell you love it. I mean you can just tell the way you talk about it. You really love it. I know you do. Can you take longer to answer this question?

1:00:07 What I love about the law is I am in a position to help to understand my clients' problems and help them reach their whatever goals they have, including solving some of their problems and monetizing some of their assets. I am in a position to help them do that, and that is it makes me feel more than a lawyer but a business partner to that and it's where I also get to practice law and have fights and the best part okay, the best part of that is helping our clients achieve their goals. But when you have a third party like a judge or a jury, say you're right, that is a very unique high, yeah, validating, sure you're right, that is a very unique high in any industry.

1:00:47 Yeah, validating. sure, it's fantastic. Of course, the opposite is horrifying and can cost you years of your life. But when you win an issue or a case, it is an incredible highlight. So those two things are the best part. So that's the best part and the worst part right there they agree or they don't. No, yeah, well, the worst part is that it's a service industry and so, no matter what I do, there are only 24 hours in the day that I can offer my clients. I can't multiply. There's no factory that I can say let's just build another factory and make another million widgets, let's build another factory and make another million widgets, and so the margins that I can command, even if I get associates and I put that leverage system in play, that only gets you so far and they only have 24 hours and of course you can't work anybody 24 hours for any extended period of time.

1:01:56 So that puts economic pressure on firms to deal with hourly rates and hourly billings and all of that kind of the business of law. The economics of law, which I think is frankly it is the worst part in my view of the law, is that mechanism of how we value our time. Instead of valuing a solution or a project or an approach, which we're not quite there on figuring that all out, we pay for our time and that's, I think, the worst part of what I do. For a young person at the beginning of their career journey who is trying to figure out how to make the best use of their time.

1:02:36 And if you had advice for somebody who wanted to follow a similar path, what would you tell them? Don't do it. No, no, I wouldn't tell them that. I wouldn't tell them that. I wouldn't tell them that Because, frankly, if I'm crazy enough to do this, I want a lot more crazies to join me in the process too. I don't want to be alone. I don't want to be alone, so no, I don't want that. So it's been a wildly rewarding career. Rewarding career. I'm not quite that. I've got years to go. But if I, the advice I would give a young associate is you know, be, demonstrate your willingness and ability to learn outside of the curriculum that you're dealing with in law school.

1:03:24 Absorb as much as you possibly can about artificial intelligence and what's happening in that industry, from learning how to code at least rudimentary code, through understanding you know their algorithms themselves, all you know certificate courses. Just gobble that up, because this is a tool that they're undoubtedly going to have to learn and they are likely to be in a position to know more about it than people a generation or two ahead of them. So to be experts in that sooner will just be so much better for them. And then, what is your? If you're saying this person wants to follow an IP route? What is your passion in that space? Do you like the cosmetic industry?

1:04:05 Do you like the fashion industry? Do you like more trademark stuff? Do you like the fashion industry? Do you like more trademark stuff? Do you like AI so much that you're really more of a copyright soft computer science person? You're going to follow that route? Or are you looking to be more of a hardcore technologist engineer, biochemist, physicist, that kind of stuff? And what is it then? Where is your industry passion? What is it? Did you build a car? No, I didn't build a car when I was a young kid, but I particularly remember my mom telling me when I was young I think people are telling me I should buy an old engine and let you take it apart and put it back together. Take it apart, put it back together. She never did that because she realized it would probably blow the house up, but that would have been fun. That would have been a lot of fun. Are you that kind of? person. Are you that kind of person that's tinkering with things, putting things together, painting for gold in the backyard, whatever it might be that industry, you know, let's take that, use that.

1:04:59 Yep Find a passion within the space. Yes, that's right. You see why I use a thousand words when one will do. Well, that is actually a perfect setup for where I was headed next to close out our really fascinating conversation, which is your podcast. So I mentioned it off the top. You have a podcast called and Motion. Tell us about it? Sure, tell us about it, sure, so, so I'm. This is my third podcast in the space, but crawl, yeah, we're in crawl ampersand more, and crawl in more and crawl in motion. So that's where the in motion podcast came from. This is a podcast that seeks to address all things transportation related, so it's not just ip issues, it's everything within the space legal issues and technical and business issues.

1:05:45 In this space we have a we've now. We have a number of tasks that we've had now over the we launched this year, so probably around seven, eight or nine and we have guests from all over the industry come in and talk about their particular company, what they're addressing in the industry, what they're seeing, come down the pike as well as some of my colleagues getting on to talk about some of the legal issues, and the experts come on and talk about whatever the business or other issues are. But it's an opportunity for listeners to hear about the space and to continue to geek out, so to speak, about what is happening in a critical. Part of what is the human experience is transportation.

1:06:27 Part of what is the human experience is transportation, and so we try to bring a lot of information to the fore that's happening in this space at a time where, frankly, there's a bit of a revolution going on and there are fits and starts to it. To be sure, it's very much underway technologically, and the geopolitical issues that surround it now are like never before, and so it's an interesting time to be the host of the and Motion Podcast. I got to tell you, let me, just before we wrap it up here, I never thought I'd be into the subjects you talk about and, yes, obviously I know who you are, so it makes me want to listen to a little bit more. I find your podcast really interesting, Paul. I really really do. Agreed, I really really Well, I try to take your voices, you know, take your voices down a little like another octave, and slow down.

1:07:14 Welcome to the In Motion podcast. Exactly, exactly. Well, I listened to your opening. You were great. You were great, liven it up a little bit. You've had eight episodes. I think you've had eight episodes. The only one I wasn't able to get into was one where you talked about like government torts. That one I couldn't do. The rest. I love, I get it, but for that one person within that industry who needs to. Oh my God, they're going to love it. They're going to love it. The tax, the tax issues. Some of these issues are tougher than others, to be sure, but for the people that need to know that stuff, oh boy, they need to know that stuff, courses for courses. I never thought I'd find it so interesting. I really find it interesting. That's great so. Paul, I want to be sure that everybody can find your podcast, so is it on every possible platform?

1:08:00 Where can people discover this? Well, certainly they can go to this, the Corlin Mooring website, or even just a general web search, and put in Paul Keller, ampersand and motion, ampersand, motion, and they will find it. But it's all over the net. It's all over the different platforms. Apple and all the other platforms, all that stuff, so it's all over the place. But the Coral Moring website and motion Keller, it will pop right up. Perfect. Well, paul, this conversation I think I can speak for all three of us that we've learned a ton over the course of the past hour and uh you know I'm I slash. We are greatly appreciative that you spent the time with us. It's absolutely my pleasure. I can. I can absolutely represent that some of that actually was true, and so it's been my pleasure.

1:08:44 And so it's been my pleasure, my absolute pleasure, run for office. Paul Keller. I will vote for you. Is that next? Well, I'm not. So I'm in New Hope, pennsylvania, right now. The mayor of New Hope is a gentleman named Larry Keller, and when Larry Keller found out that Paul Keller lives in New Hope, there was the very quick suggestion by him that I should run for mayor of New Hope, for the simple reason that he wants to be able to have name recognition. Keller, Keller, Keller. That's it.

1:09:24 Nice, that may be the beginning. Nice, paul, thank you so much. You're very welcome. Thanks for the time. Thank you so much, you're very welcome. Thanks for the time. So that was Paul Keller, who has undoubtedly proven that the law and litigation and patents and all of those things can be absolutely fascinating. What a great storyteller he is, tushar, thank you so much for bringing him to us. My pleasure, guys, that was fun, right, absolutely All right. So Paul and his passion for patents which is a hard thing to say right off the bat and an even harder thing sometimes for us to understand that you know, we all have, obviously, these, the computers that we use, the phones that we use they all have to come from somewhere and it's guys like Paul who have helped to make those dreams come true for so many, whether it be companies or for individual business owners.

1:10:11 It is fascinating to get into that world of being a futurist in some ways. Right, you're looking at technology for the future today and helping those folks who are essentially trying to implement these technologies in the safest way possible for all of us to use. I really enjoyed listening to his journey from when I was in college to when I went to law school, to what it means then to get into the world of corporate legal work, and it is kind of fascinating to see that you will do a lot of career jumping throughout your time when you're working and if you're able to kind of find that little niche for yourself, you know, heck, you're going to make a real career out of it.

1:10:53 And he's been super successful at it. Yeah, and you mentioned the word passion there, t I thought his advice was really on point. You know, just find your passion first and foremost and you know he has it but then using your passion right and really finding out exactly what you want to do within the industry. You know, it's not enough to just say I want to be a lawyer, like. There's so much in there that you could possibly do in terms of law, and I think Paul Keller is a great example of a guy who didn't really know but then found out exactly how he wanted to use his law degree and his law skills and look where it's brought him. So you know, listen to Paul's advice.

1:11:34 Find your passion, use your passion and find out exactly where you want to use that passion, with whatever career field you're talking about, because it really works for anything right, if you don't have the drive, you're not going to do anything. But once you have that drive, find out how to really hone in on it and use it like a laser, because that's what Paul Keller did. Absolutely, and for me, one of the key takeaways was if you're a small guy out there who has an idea, has a vision and you've created something that you want to bring forward, there are people like Paul in the world who have your back and can defend you. And I've worked in business, obviously, for a very long time and I've seen many situations where a small company has a great idea and they brought it forward and the behemoth has said, uh-uh, not on my turf, no way, no how, and they will out-litigate the small guy who's trying to break in.

1:12:31 And there are so many instances of little companies disappearing because they just can't survive those legal battles. Well, as Paul talked about, there are associations that are set up now and there are ways to find funds to help you fight that battle, and people like Paul will do that for you, which is critically important, and it's just good to hear that there are people out there looking out for the little guy. So with that, paul Keller, thank you so much for joining this episode of no Wrong Choices. Be sure to check out his podcast and motion On behalf of Tushar Saxena, larry Shea and me. Larry Samuels, thank you for joining this episode of no Wrong Choices.

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