Emily Howard

Emily is a European and UK Patent Attorney. She provides patent advice in a range of biological areas, including cancer biology, vaccines, induced pluripotent stem cells, regenerative medicine and molecular biology. She also has particular expertise in gene therapy, having devoted significant amounts of time to the development of IP strategies in this field.

Emily has worked closely with in-house counsel on both strategic and practical matters, having seconded to a biotechnology company for 5 years. Thus, she is particularly experienced in building and handling global patent portfolios for small to medium sized UK-based companies. She is very aware of commercial priorities and the need to make the best use of resources. She is used to thinking creatively in order to optimise IP strategies, such as streamlining the prosecution of a global patent family by focussing initially on developing a successful prosecution strategy in one jurisdiction, and then leveraging the granted patent in other jurisdictions.

Emily is very knowledgeable in relation to freedom to operate (FTO) matters and has been heavily involved in developing strategies for FTO analysis and ongoing surveillance. She has also assisted in the preparations required for securing funding and for a company going through an IPO.

Emily has considerable experience in drafting. This has included preparing drafts for multi-disciplinary inventions, such as applications which relate to both DNA constructs and lipid assemblies. She is also used to working closely with scientists to ensure an invention is properly captured during the drafting process.

Prior to joining J A Kemp, Emily studied Natural Sciences at the University of Cambridge. Her studies focussed on pathology, in particular microbiology and cancer biology, where she was awarded the Project Prize in cellular and genetic pathology. She went on to complete a PhD in pathology at the University of Cambridge. Her PhD focused on human papillomavirus (HPV), which causes cervical cancer. Her work crossed the fields of cancer biology, innate immunology and virology as she investigated how HPV evades innate immune detection.

Emily joined J A Kemp in 2011 and became an associate in 2018.