Dana Zottola focuses on patent drafting and prosecution in the electrical and computer engineering arts. She received her master’s in electrical and computer engineering from Oregon State University, where her thesis centered on hardware-based numerical algorithms. Before working at Alston & Bird, she leveraged her technology background as the sole technical resource at a small Silicon Valley based firm, where she evaluated patent portfolios, performed claim (infringement and validity) analyses and assisted with expert reports relating to infringement, validity and damages.
Dana is a registered patent agent and experienced patent prosecutor. She has nearly a decade of experience prosecuting hundreds of patents in fields as diverse as digital rights management to semiconductor device design and manufacturing. Dana has experience in all aspects of U.S. and international patent prosecution, including patent application preparation, responses to office actions, examiner interviews and portfolio strategy. Additionally, in the context of inter partes reviews, she has prepared preliminary patent owner responses, patent owner responses, demonstratives and exhibits for oral hearings, and represented parties at the oral hearing. Dana’s experience and background in litigation allows her important insight into the patent prosecution process.