Michelle M. Kemp

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Michelle M. Kemp — Patent Litigation Practice Summary

Practice focus. Kemp is a Madison, Wisconsin–based patent litigator whose docket spans a wide technology range rather than a single standards silo. Firm and Chambers descriptions cite microprocessors, medical devices, antibody libraries, genetically engineered plants, and mechanical devices, and her reported matters include LED lighting (Cree; Ruud Lighting), medical imaging and medical-records software, helmets, conveyor equipment, chemical/industrial processes, and university life-sciences licensing. Her tracked case list is concentrated in one technology: mercury-emission control chemistry for coal-fired power plants (halogen-promoted sorbents and activated-carbon injection), litigated across the ME2C/Birchtech patent family pending in the S.D. Iowa MDL No. 3132 and related venues. Chambers USA ranks her Band 3 for Intellectual Property: Litigation (Wisconsin) and notes her trial capability.

Side preference. Her practice is predominantly defense-side. Of five tracked appearances, four are as counsel for defendants — Berkshire Hathaway Energy, PacifiCorp, MidAmerican Energy, Interstate Power & Light, and Wisconsin Power & Light — in the Midwest Energy Emissions (now Birchtech) suits, and one is as counsel for plaintiff Berkshire Hathaway Energy in its declaratory-judgment action against Birchtech (D. Wyo., No. 2:25-cv-00015). That plaintiff-side entry is best read as the mirror-image DJ/defensive posture arising from the same dispute rather than as NPE/PAE-side assertion work, though her broader portfolio does include genuine patentee-side enforcement (Riddell, U.S. Water Services, Cree, University of Washington, WARF).

Firm context. All tracked appearances are with Perkins Coie, where she is a partner in the Patent Litigation practice; she has previously served as managing partner of the firm's Madison office, a member of the firm's executive committee, and co-chair of the Patent Litigation practice (WIPR's 2024 US patent ranking listed her as co-chair alongside Tyler Bowen). Current Chambers and firm materials list the practice under the "Ashurst Perkins Coie" name, reflecting the firm's combination/rebranding; no prior firm history is reliably sourced.

Notable matters and outcomes. Reported results attributed to her include a $5 million willful-infringement jury verdict for Riddell in Riddell Inc. v. Kranos Corp. (N.D. Ill.) over the "Vengeance" football helmet line, and a $7.5 million jury verdict for U.S. Water Services in U.S. Water Services v. Novozymes A/S on phytase patents used in ethanol processing. In the ME2C/Birchtech dispute, she defends utility defendants; the related 2024 Delaware jury verdict of roughly $57 million against other (CERT Operations) defendants — upheld against post-trial challenges in 2025 — provides the backdrop, and the S.D. Iowa court granted in part and denied in part her clients' motions to dismiss, transferring or dismissing several defendants while allowing claims to proceed against certain co-owned facilities. Her clients are also petitioners in a large coordinated IPR campaign against the Birchtech patents.

PTAB/IPR experience. She appears regularly in post-grant proceedings as backup counsel, including the Birchtech family IPRs (e.g., IPR2025-00274/278/280/281, -00422/423/424/425, -00687/688) for the Berkshire Hathaway Energy and Wisconsin utility petitioners, and an earlier petitioner-side IPR for Peloton Interactive (IPR2023-01164). These proceedings produced a precedential Director Review decision, PacifiCorp v. Birchtech, IPR2025-00687, Paper 40 (Jan. 12, 2026), addressing multiple-petition and real-party-in-interest issues.

Bar and education. Registered patent attorney (Reg. No. 48,438); admitted in Wisconsin (1997) and D.C. (2003), the Federal, Seventh, and D.C. Circuits, and E.D./W.D. Wis.; J.D., University of Wisconsin Law School (1997, cum laude, Order of the Coif) and B.S., University of Wisconsin (1994).