14 DAY TRIAL // Bloomberg Businessweek is running a feature piece on Noreen Krall, a patent litigation expert hired by Apple in 2010 as Steve Jobs was about to wage a “thermonuclear” war on competitors in the smartphone space.
A New York native, Krall was actually trained as an electrical engineer, Bloomberg reports. She has two daughters in college pursuing engineering degrees, and her career is on a roll.
After managing portfolios of tens of thousands of applications for the likes of IBM and Sun Microsystems, Krall took on an even tougher job – Senior Director of IP Law and Litigation at Apple Inc.
Already an expert in what she was doing (mainly suing other companies for IP infringement), Krall has developed “an almost paranoid capability to see ahead and around corners,” according to Mark Chandler, general counsel for Cisco Systems Inc. and an acquaintance of Krall’s.
She’s now a familiar face in courtrooms around the world. As Apple’s chief litigation counsel, the high-point of her career came with Apple’s victory against Samsung on Aug. 24, when a California jury ordered the latter to cough up more than $1 billion (€800 million) for infringing patents owned by the Cupertino giant.
One key takeaway from the Bloomberg feature, “Krall’s job includes understanding the patent rules and court procedures in more than three dozen jurisdictions, making sure arguments are consistent, providing feedback and keeping her team motivated. She observes her lawyers’ arguments from benches or public seating in the back of courtrooms, leaving with them at the end of the day.”
The story also reveals that Krall sent a note to junior members of the team thanking them for their hard work even before the verdict came.
Commenting on Krall’s recent victory, John Thorne of Kellogg Huber said, “There is no historical precedent for what Noreen Krall is doing.”
Thorne, who previously ran Verizon Communications Inc.’s intellectual-property team, added that “Good generalship produces results like Noreen has gotten. She’s mastering big decisions, like which law firms to hire, how to manage resources, how much of Tim Cook’s time to take.”