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Our People

At PATENT.INFO, our people are trained professionals with one first priority: to serve the clients needs transparently, efficiently, and at a fair price.

John Moetteli, Esq., Founder

For about fifteen years, John Moetteli has been a practicing patent practitioner/attorney-at-law, licensed before the US Patent Office--he's also admitted to practice before the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, the District of Columbia Bar (Washington DC), as well as his home state bar. Further, he's a registered Professional Engineer, currently on inactive status. Since 1997, Mr. Moetteli represented U.S., Swiss and European clients, working with Bugnion S.A. as well as other top Swiss firms.

He has holds an Engineering degree, a Doctor of Jurisprudence degree, and a Masters in International Management (with emphasis on Doing Business in China). In addition, he’s followed courses on Chinese Patent Law, including co-editing a well known manual on industrial property. His technical specialty is mechanical, IT, software, and sports products. He is particularly specialized in preparing non-infringement, invalidity and unenforceability opinions on US patents, as well as preparing US and International patent and trademark applications.

Mr. Moetteli is a member of the Association of International Business Lawyers (AIBL), the American Intellectual Property Law Association (AIPLA), and the International Association for the Protection of Intellectual Property (AIPPI). He's been inducted into the Order of the Barons and Order of the Coif, well-known honorary legal fraternities. He's also the founder of the North American Attorney's Association in Geneva and is a former member of the managing committee for the Association of International Business Lawyers. He's published several articles on the subject of intellectual property law as well.

Prior to moving to Geneva, Mr. Moetteli worked in the intellectual property section of Haynes & Boone LLP, a large general litigation firm with offices in Texas, Washington D.C. and Mexico City . He earned his Doctor of Jurisprudence magna cum laude from the University of Houston Law Center, a highly ranked law school. Prior to his experience with Haynes & Boone, Mr. Moetteli worked at NASA where his responsibilities included technology management. During this time, his work was featured on the Discovery Channel's Invention Series cable television program.

Mr. Moetteli’s mother tongue is English, but he’s also conversant in French and German.

Novella Moetteli-Mantelli

Ms. Moetteli - Mantelli is a licensed Swiss attorney-at-law registered as a legal representative before the European Patent Office. She earned her Law degree from the University of Geneva. Prior to joining the firm, she worked for the Swiss Federal Banking Commission in Berne, in the department for the authorization of banks, securities dealers and investment funds. She has litigation experience and spent several months as a clerk for the Court of Appeals in Geneva.

Her keen interest in Trademark Law, particularly International trademark law, English and German language skills, as well as the fact that French is her mother-tongue, make her a valuable firm asset, particularly for international trademark prosecution that must be conducted in French for our Swiss clients.

Sherman D. Pernia, Ph.D., J.D (of counsel)

Sherman Pernia is a licensed attorney-at-law (Texas), and registered as a Patent Agent before the US Patent & Trademark Office. Since 2002, Dr. Pernia has been "of counsel" with Da Vinci Partners, specializing in the biomed and electronic patent filings handled by the firm.

He has experience working with academic departments and small businesses to identify programs or products embodying technologies ripe for commercial development and in the development and implementation of mechanisms for the protection, further R&D and commercialization of these properties. His work has facilitated transferring technologies out of the laboratory and into the commercial arena, and has thus involved patenting, funding development, marketing and negotiating proprietary rights, joint ventures and preparing licensing agreements to commercialize proprietary technologies.

From 1991 to 1993, Dr. Pernia worked as a Patent Agent with Fulbright & Jaworski, L.L.P. in Houston, Texas, providing patent prosecution support to the firm’s intellectual property section, particularly in the biomed/biotechnology and related fields.

Sylvain Roy, IP Valuation and Licensing Specialist (of counsel)

Sylvain Roy is a Canadian attorney (Quebec Bar) and strategy consultant that specializes in licensing, IP valuation, product valuation and business development. Through positions such as COO, CEO and legal counsel of technology companies, Sylvain has gained a diversified experience of licensing and of exploiting intellectual property (IP) in a transnational environment.

An initiator and problem solver, Sylvain can leverage an holistic know-how of technology, IP law, marketing and finance to assess the economic value of products, technologies and patent rights.

He also focuses on designing and implementing workable business strategies to optimize the valuation & value realization of IP and other intangible assets, in harmony with financing and exit strategies. Sylvain's experience of local markets covers Canada, China, France, Italy, Scandinavia, S-E Asia, Switzerland and USA.

Sonja Hodel

Sonja Hodel has been with Da Vinci Partners since our founding and helps management ensure that the books are properly maintained and that accounts receivable and payable function well.

She is Swiss, born and raised in Basel, and speaks fluent German, French and English.

Jasmin Hug

Jasmin Hug has been with Da Vinci Partners since 2005 and handles correspondence and administrative matters with clients and intellectual property offices. She also supervises deadlines and is responsible for our payments.

She is Swiss, born and raised near Zurich. She speaks fluent English, French, Spanish and Portuguese and is currently learning Chinese.

Nathan Martyn

Nathan Martyn, CTO of Patent.Info, is an Australian software developer and Honours graduate in Computer Science. After suffering the personal loss of this long-time supervisor and friend, John Douglass, Nathan has taken over John’s responsibilities as CTO of Patent.Info.

Nathan intends to continue the hard work his former compatriot demonstrated whilst at Patent.Info.