Atlanta attorney lands leading role at prominent national firm

An unconventional move after law school propelled Atlanta attorney Charley Brown into a niche patent practice that has led him to a top role at Ballard Spahr, a prominent national law firm with more than 750 lawyers in 19 offices.

Brown, 49, is leading more than 70 lawyers and other specialists around the country as the new chair of Ballard Spahr’s intellectual property department. He’s the fourth person to serve in the role, previously held by Lynn Rzonca, a senior attorney based in the firm’s Philadelphia office.

The bulk of intellectual property litigation occurs in federal courts outside Georgia, including in Delaware, Texas, California and New York, where most companies are incorporated and tailored rules are applied by experienced judges familiar with the field.

But Ballard Spahr’s deep bench of intellectual property specialists in Atlanta, combined with Brown’s experience and leadership qualities, made him the right choice, firm chair Peter Michaud told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

“First and foremost, he’s an excellent attorney, but beyond that, he’s very devoted to pro bono work and is genuinely interested in the professional development of earlier-career attorneys,” Michaud said of Brown. “Those attributes make him exceptionally well-rounded and a natural choice to build on all the excellent work Lynn Rzonca has done.”

It was Brown’s somewhat unorthodox decision in 2002, upon graduating from Mercer University School of Law in Macon, to do a master’s degree in bioinformatics at Georgia Tech that set him on the path to his new role.

Brown said the field of bioinformatics, which uses computers to analyze biological information, was “really coming into its own” at the time and has remained “hot.”

“I saw that as an opportunity to sort of distinguish myself among the tons of brand-new patent lawyers looking for a job,” Brown said of his master’s degree.

The strategy worked.

After graduating from Georgia Tech, Brown secured an associate position at Needle & Rosenberg, a prestigious intellectual property boutique law firm in Atlanta. Several years later, Brown and his Needle & Rosenberg colleagues established the intellectual property department at the Atlanta office of Ballard Spahr when the two firms combined in 2008.

Atlanta attorney Charley Brown says Ballard Spahr's intellectual property clients are spread around the world. (Jason Getz/AJC)

Since then, Brown has held several leadership roles in the firm, including head of the patent division and a subgroup focused on engineering and software technology. He became a firm partner in 2013.

Brown, in his first month as chair of the intellectual property department, said he wants to build on the growth and success it had under Rzonca’s leadership of more than eight years. He said one of his goals is to have intellectual property lawyers in all the firm’s offices.