Banner Witcoff is sponsoring the 2020 AlphaLab Gear Hardware Cup, an international pitch competition for early-stage hardware startups.
As part of the sponsorship, the firm will award, to one finalist, free legal services of preparing and filing a patent application. This is the first time a patent application is being offered as part of the competition.
The Hardware Cup consists of six regional competitions, taking place in Pittsburgh, Boston, Washington, D.C., Raleigh, Chicago, and San Jose, as well as several international competitions. At each event, startups will give three-minute pitches to a panel of judges made up of local investors and venture capitalists. The finals will be held May 19 in Pittsburgh, where the winning team will be awarded a $50,000 grand prize.
Banner Witcoff attorney Justin Philpott spoke at a regional competition in Washington, D.C. on Feb. 12 and will speak at another in Chicago on March 11.
“We are thrilled to be sponsoring this innovative competition and to be able to provide such a unique prize,” Justin said. “As an intellectual property law firm with a 100-year history, Banner Witcoff has extensive experience preparing and filing patent applications for clients of all sizes. But, we also recognize it’s not something that every startup is able to do on their own, and we are excited to be able to offer this as part of our sponsorship of Hardware Cup.”
Click here for information about the Hardware Cup, and here to learn more about our IP capabilities.
Posted: February 10, 2020
