Administrative Patent Judge Linda Horner currently serves as the Acting Vice Chief Judge of the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) at the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO). She also is leading a team at the USPTO to advance President Biden’s Executive Order on “Promoting Competition in American Economy.” In this role, she oversees collaboration initiatives between the USPTO and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.
Judge Horner recently completed an assignment as a Senior Legal Advisor to the Under Secretary of Commerce for Intellectual Property and Director of the USPTO. As Senior Legal Advisor, she counseled the USPTO Director on a wide-range of patent-related legal and policy issues.
Judge Horner joined the USPTO as an Administrative Patent Judge in 2006. She has previously served as Acting Vice Chief Administrative Patent Judge of the PTAB from 2013-2014, Chair of the Published Cases Committee from 2011-2015, and Lead Administrative Patent Judge from 2007-2012. While at the USPTO, Judge Horner has helped shape agency policy at the intersection of AIA trials and district court proceedings, including authoring precedential and informative PTAB decisions and rulemakings. She also has worked extensively on ex parte appeals and authored rulemaking on ex parte appeal procedures. She speaks regularly on AIA trial practice.
Prior to joining the USPTO, Judge Horner was a partner at Sterne, Kessler, Goldstein & Fox P.L.L.C. in Washington D.C., where she prosecuted patent applications, represented clients in interference proceedings before the USPTO, litigated patent cases in district courts and on appeal to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, and represented clients in arbitration proceedings before the International Chamber of Commerce.
Judge Horner is a graduate of Boston University School of Law and Cornell University.
