Woodard, Emhardt is excited to be participating in this year’s Midwest Intellectual Property Summit, building on the 2009 Symposium that featured a broad range of intellectual property topics.  Attendees will enjoy an interactive question and answer session with a panel consisting of a European patent attorney, an in-house U.S. patent attorney, a European patent examiner, and Woodard, Emhardt patent attorney Ken Gandy.  Other presentations include an in-depth analysis of the state of Seventh Circuit law on product design trade dress, a presentation on the varying degrees of experience of federal judges in handling patent cases and how you can obtain and use targeted information about the judges hearing your cases, and a presentation concerning the rules for accelerated examination and best practice suggestions for implementing them and discussion regarding the differences between patent drafting for U.S. examination and patent drafting for European examination from the perspective of a European private practice patent attorney and a European Patent Office examiner working in the Vaccines and Antibodies art area.  This event presents an unparalleled opportunity to gain insights into European Patent Office practice directly from an EPO representative and to hear from other patent practitioners concerning their best practice suggestions, particularly as they relate to the pitfall-laden transition of a U.S. application to fit European standards.