Robert Barr

Robert is of counsel in our Silicon Valley office. He advises our clients on all aspects of intellectual property law, including patent portfolio development, patent enforcement and defense, infringement and validity analysis, licensing, litigation, software protection, and IP due diligence for investments, public offerings and acquisitions.

Robert has been a prominent Silicon Valley patent attorney for over 30 years and has been affiliated with Gunderson Dettmer since 2005. He was the first vice president for Intellectual Property and Worldwide Patent Counsel for Cisco Systems in San Jose, California, where he was responsible for all patent prosecution, licensing and litigation. He designed and implemented Cisco’s patent strategy and built a portfolio of over 5,000 patents and applications. From 2005-2015, he was Executive Director of the Berkeley Center for Law & Technology and Lecturer-in-Residence at the University of California, Berkeley School of Law (Boalt Hall).  He also taught patent law as an adjunct professor at Hastings College of the Law.

A frequent speaker on patent reform, Robert testified at the Federal Trade Commission hearings on Competition and Intellectual Property Law and Policy in the Knowledge-Based Economy. He was named by the Daily Journal as one of the top 25 intellectual property lawyers in California in 2003, and as one of the top 10 in-house intellectual property lawyers in 2004.

Robert received his J.D. cum laude from Boston University School of Law, and degrees in Electrical Engineering and Political Science from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He started his patent practice at the law firm of Townsend and Townsend, and has also been a partner at Brobeck, Phleger and Harrison and Weil, Gotshal and Manges.