Mr. Hilten is head of McGuireWoods' patent prosecution group, and a registered patent attorney who focuses on patent prosecution and related counseling. He has extensive experience with counseling and analysis in every facet of utility and design patent prosecution including initial invention disclosure, patent application drafting, responses, filing reissues and reexaminations, patent appeals and foreign filing.

He has significant technical experience in the fields of electrical engineering, mechanical engineering, and aerospace engineering, and has prosecuted patents in a wide range of industries including aerospace, consumer electronics, consumer and home products, footwear, furniture, industrial equipment, manufacturing, medical devices, power tools, and telecommunications.

Representative Prosecution/Counseling Technologies

Representative Litigated Matters

Prior to joining McGuireWoods, Mr. Hilten worked as for two years with a law firm that specialized in intellectual property matters. He also worked for 13 years at the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (PTO). He started his career as a patent examiner in printer technology in 1989, and was promoted to primary examiner in 1996. He was granted a lengthy detail to the Technology Center special programs office where he reviewed reexamination, reissue, and Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT) matters, and drafted petition decisions for the group directors. He was promoted to supervisory patent examiner (SPE) in 1999.

As an SPE he managed several art units in the technology areas of printers and measuring, testing, and data processing. He developed logistics for handling the technical and legal issues surrounding numerous PTO projects including Pre-Grant Publication (PGPUB), Mega Applications (electronic submission of very large DNA sequences and computer algorithms), and Patent Term Adjustment (PTA).