Andrew Eisenberg of Michael Best & Friedrich LLP

Andrew will discuss the basics of intellectual property, patents, trademarks, and copyrights from the perspective of the inventor or engineer. He will cover topics such as employee’s IP obligations to the employer when transition between positions and keeping at home or garage projects distinct from the corporate work environment.

Biography:

Andrew is a partner with Michael Best. Andrew is also a registered patent attorney as well as a former general counsel and programmer. Andrew is a named inventor on three issued patents 8,565,458, 8,582,790, 8,611,570 as well as pending application 2013/0177188.

He is primarily engaged in assisting technology startups and small business navigate the complex legal landscape associated with starting a business, developing strategic IP assets, raising capital, and planning an exit strategy. As a former general counsel for an Austin based startup, Andrew is able to provide his clients with unique insights and knowledge regarding the legal challenges and benefits of building and maintaining a result driven portfolio in an entrepreneurial environment.

Andrew has been featured as a guest speaker on the radio broadcast the Struggling Entrepreneur, a judge for the University of Texas - Texas Venture Labs Investment Competition, a guest topic expert on the television series Austin Business Matters, and a guest columnist with CEO Magazine, Business 2 Community, the Austin Business Journal, and the Texas CEO Magazine. Andrew has also presented for organizations including: SXSW, Innovation Week Austin, Austin Inventors and Entrepreneurs Association, Austin Inventopreurs, and BOSS-Talks Tech.

Address:Austin, Texas, United States

Dr. Qing-Chang Zhong (DL) of Illinois Institute of Technology; Syndem LLC

Power systems are going through a paradigm change. The centralized large facilities are being replaced by millions of widely dispersed non-synchronous relatively small renewable or alternative power plants, plug-in EVs, and energy storage units. Moreover, the majority of loads are expected to actively take part in the grid regulation in the same way as suppliers do. In this lecture, the system architecture, together with a technical route, to enable this paradigm change will be presented. It will be shown that the synchronization mechanism of conventional synchronous machines, which has underpinned the power systems for over 100 years, can continue playing its fundamental role in power systems. It will empower all power electronics-interfaced suppliers and loads to behave like virtual synchronous machines so that they can take part in the regulation of system frequency and voltage, in the same way as conventional synchronous machines do. This will unify the integration and interaction of all players with the grid. It will also release the communication infrastructure from low-level control and open up the prospect of achieving autonomous operation for power systems. This holistic solution could considerably enhance the stability, scalability, operability, security, reliability and resiliency of the next-generation smart grid. For latest developments and live discussions, join LinkedIn Group https://www.linkedin.com/groups/7061909/. For commercialization opportunities, click http://www.syndem.com.

Biography:

Dr. Qing-Chang Zhong is the Max McGraw Endowed Chair Professor in Energy and Power Engineering at Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago, USA, and the Founding Director of Syndem LLC, IL, USA. Having been recognized as an IEEE Fellow, an IET Fellow and a Distinguished Lecturer by the IEEE Power and Energy Society, the IEEE Control Systems Society and the IEEE Power Electronics Society, he is a world-leading multidisciplinary expert in control, power electronics and power systems. Before joining Illinois Institute of Technology, he was the Chair Professor in Control and Systems Engineering at The University of Sheffield, UK, where he built up a $5M+ research lab dedicated to the control of energy and power systems and attracted the support of Rolls-Royce, National Instruments, Texas Instruments, Siemens, ALSTOM, Turbo Power Systems, Chroma, Yokagawa, OPAL RT and other organizations. He (co-) authored three research monographs, including Robust Control of Time-delay Systems (Springer, 2006) and Control of Power Inverters in Renewable Energy and Smart Grid Integration (Wiley-IEEE Press, 2013). His fourth book entitled Power Electronics-Enabled Autonomous Power Systems: Next Generation Smart Grids, which presents the architecture and technical routes of next-generation smart grids based on the synchronization mechanism of synchronous machines, will be published by Wiley-IEEE Press in 2017. He is/was an Associate Editor for several leading journals in control and power engineering, including four IEEE Transactions. His current research focuses on addressing fundamental challenges in energy and power systems through seamless integration of advanced control/systems theory and power electronics.

Address:Chicago, United States

Andrew Eisenberg of Michael Best & Friedrich LLP

Biography:

Address:Austin, Texas, United States

Dr. Qing-Chang Zhong (DL) of Illinois Institute of Technology; Syndem LLC

Biography:

Address:Chicago, United States