Alexander I. Poltorak

Alexander I. Poltorak (born 1957) is a Russian-born American author, entrepreneur, physicist and scholar. He co-authored two books on intellectual property: Essentials of Intellectual Property and Essentials of Licensing of Intellectual Property, both published by John Wiley & Sons. He is the founder, Chairman and CEO of General Patent Corporation (GPC), an intellectual property firm focusing on patent licensing and enforcement. He is also the founder and President of American Innovators for Patent Reform, a non-profit trade association representing inventors and other stakeholders in the debate over the future of the U.S. patent system. Dr. Poltorak is a member of the IAM (Intellectual Asset Management) Strategy 250 – The World’s Leading IP Strategists. Dr. Poltorak has been interviewed by CNN, Wired.com, Inc. magazine, CFO Magazine, InstitutionalInvestor.com, WallStreetReporter.com, The New York Times, Bloomberg TV and several others, for his input as well as perspective on patent related news. He has been extensively quoted in publications such as Wall Street Journal, EE Times Article, the IAM Magazine and various other news media.

Early life

Alexander I. Poltorak was born in 1957 in Krasnodar, Russia, the former Soviet Union. He earned a graduate degree in Theoretical Physics – the equivalent of a Ph.D. in the United States – at Kuban State University (Kubanski Gosudarstvennyi Universitet). He devoted his academic studies to Einstein’s theory of relativity and gravitation. Poltorak published several research papers in this field and wrote his doctoral thesis on a solution to a long-standing “energy problem” in The Theory of General Relativity.

Accused by the Soviet government of Jewish nationalist dissident activity, Poltorak was stripped of his academic degrees. In 1982 he immigrated to the United States. He served as an assistant professor of biomathematics at Cornell University Medical College, where he conducted research on mathematical modeling of brain-flow circulation and on positron emission tomography. He also served as an assistant professor of physics at Touro College and as an adjunct professor of law at the Globe Institute of Technology. Poltorak served as the United States co-chair of a Subcommittee on Information Exchange of the US-USSR Trade and Economic Council.

General Patent Corporation

In 1983 Poltorak founded Rapitech Systems, Inc., a computer technology company he took public in 1986. In 1987, he formed Poltorak Associates, a patent licensing company and a predecessor of General Patent Corporation (GPC) which was incorporated in 1989. GPC was selected by Marketing Computers Magazine as one of “Nine for the Nineties” – one of the nine most promising technology companies for the 90s. Dr. Poltorak serves as Chairman and CEO of General Patent Corporation.

IP Holdings LLC

Main article: General Patent Corporation (section IP Holdings LLC)

In 1990, Poltorak founded IP Holdings LLC, an IP-Centric merchant banking organization, and serves as its Managing Director. IP Holdings provides IP-related financial and brokerage services, operates an idea incubator and manages portfolio of early-stage IP-rich companies.

American Innovators for Patent Reform

Alexander Poltorak is founder and President of American Innovators for Patent Reform (AIPR), a not-for-profit coalition of inventors, patent owners, researchers, engineers, entrepreneurs, corporate executives, patent agents and attorneys, and others involved in creating or protecting innovation and advocating for stronger patent protection.

AIPR was founded when the Patent Reform Act of 2007 was introduced in Congress. The 2007 Patent Reform Act failed to pass in the Senate. AIPR also opposed the Patent Reform Act of 2009.

Scholarly Research and Writings

Dr. Poltorak is a public speaker and writer, and a recognized expert on physics and IP strategy and valuation through his published articles, lectures and research on physics, brain research, economics, intellectual property law, science and religion.

He co-authored (with Paul J. Lerner) two influential books on intellectual property law, Essentials of Intellectual Property and Essentials of Licensing Intellectual Property. Essentials of Intellectual Property is a primer about patents and other types of intellectual property and how intellectual capital should be properly managed as a valuable asset. Dr. Poltorak's first book, Essentials of Intellectual Property First Edition, has been re-released in a Second Edition in 2011. Essentials of Licensing Intellectual Property is a how-to-book for intellectual property licensing, licensing strategies, royalties and royalty rates, patent, trademarks and copyright licenses, and basic contract law. Poltorak contributed the chapter “On Patent Trolls and Other Patent Myths” to Making Innovation Pay: People Who Turn IP Into Shareholder Value, edited by Bruce Berman.

Patent Related Articles

• "Patents; Licensing boutiques help inventors with patent claims against big companies (Teresa Riordan, New York Times, June 10, 2002)
• “What You Need to Know About Patents and Their Value” (Technology Review.com, April, 2005)
• “Patent Trolls’ and Injunctive Relief” (Patent Strategy & Management, v.6, No. 12, May 2006)
• “The Supreme Court Take the Middle Ground in the eBay Case” (Patent Strategy & Management, v.6, No. 12, July 2006)
• "U.S. Can't Afford to Mar Innovation," Alexander Poltorak (Christian Science Monitor Opinion Page, January 28, 2008
• "Microsoft Lawyers Start to Sweep Up Word Mess" (E-Commerce Times, August 19, 2009)
• "Your ‘carrot’ licenses may be ‘stick’ licenses in disguise" (Intellectual Property Marketing Advisor, September 22, 2009)
• ”Thar’s Gold in Them Thar Patents: Why It Pays to Protect Patent Portfolios” (University Business Magazine, October 2009)
• “Apple Raises Stakes in Patent Duel With Nokia” (MacNewsWorld, January 18, 2010)
• "Will Apple's Patents Banish HTC Phones?" (PCWorld, Jared Newman, March 3, 2010)
• "Patent Enforcement: What to do and what not to do" (Industryweek.com, April 10, 2010)

Books

• Essentials of Intellectual Property - First Edition, Alexander I. Poltorak and Paul J. Lerner (John Wiley & Sons Publishers, Inc., 2002)
• Essentials of Licensing Intellectual Property, Alexander I. Poltorak and Paul J. Lerner (John Wiley & Sons Publishers, Inc., 2003)
• Making Innovation Pay: People Who Turn IP Into Shareholder Value, Ed. B. Berman (John Wiley & Sons Publishers, Inc., 2006)
• Essentials of Intellectual Property - Second Edition, Alexander I. Poltorak and Paul J. Lerner (John Wiley & Sons Publishers, Inc., 2011)

Media

• Transcript of Alexander Poltorak's Radio Interview with the Wall Street Reporter, (2000)
• Transcript of Alexander Poltorak's Radio Interview with Bloomberg News, (2000)
• Alexander Poltorak quoted in EE Times article, "Patent Pangs" by Margaret Quan, (2001)
• The New York Times, "Trying to Cash In on Patents" by Teresa Riordan, June 10, 2002: Dr. Poltorak discusses the patent licensing and enforcement business.
• CNNFn, "Dr. Alexander Poltorak on Patent Law" (2002) on YouTube
• CFO Magazine, "Battling the Property Pirates," January 2004, by Ronald Fink - Article in which Dr. Poltorak is quoted about protecting American IP interests abroad.
• AM (Intellectual Asset Management) Magazine, Feb./March 2004 issue - "Prickly Profits," by Bruce Berman (excerpt) - Dr. Poltorak is quoted discussing the patent system's fairness or unfairness to small inventors.
• GPC's Chairman and CEO spoke at the Intellectual Property Owners conference on Patent Trolls in Washington, DC in March 2005
• Bloomberg TV Video Interview, "Dr. Alexander Poltorak Predicts 'Patent War' from Nortel Patent Auction"
• Alexander Poltorak was interviewed by Globes, Israel's daily business magazine, in March 2006
• “The Ballad of the Patent Troll" (2010) on YouTube
• Alexander Poltorak explains the various reasons companies file patent infringement lawsuits in "Google's Android lawsuit ghost returns" (International Business Times, October 26, 2010).
• International Business Times, October 18, 2010), Alexander Poltorak explains why Oracle's refusal to license the technology compatibility kit (TCK) to Project Harmony is a legitimate use of its intellectual property.
• In this in-depth interview with Fast Company, "Why Apple's Patent Infringement Payout Is Still in Play" (October 5, 2010), Alexander Poltorak discusses the recent jury verdict against Apple in favor of Mirror Worlds LLC. "Relative to the booming sales of the infringing products," Dr. Poltorak says, "this ($625.5 million) verdict is not terribly large or unusual."
• GPC's Alexander Poltorak was quoted in a Wall Street Journal article, "Paul Allen's Lawsuit Renews Patent Debate,"
• GPC's Alex Poltorak interviewed regarding the current lawsuit between Apple and Samsung by MacNewsWorld/E-Commerce Times, (2011).
• Alex Poltorak Interviewed on National Public Radio's "All Things Considered" Segment (2011)
• Alex Poltorak Interviewed by Seattle, Wash. public radio station KUOW about Facebook's purchase of hundreds of patents from Microsoft (April 2012)
• GPC's Alexander Poltorak the IP expert consulted for an article examining Samsung's options in its ongoing patent war with Apple (June 2012).
• Alexander Poltorak was among the IP experts interviewed for an article speculating on RIM's options for saving itself - such as possible patent sales to Facebook or Google.(June 2012)
• Alexander Poltorak commented on what went wrong with RIM whose shares are currently 95 percent lower than they were at their peak just four years ago.(July 2012)