Duke leverages more than 20 years of experience in pharmaceutical research and intellectual property law to help life sciences companies protect and monetize their innovations.
Duke combines his scientific knowledge and skill, and his deep understanding of pharmaceutical patent practice to advise life sciences clients on all aspects of securing protection for and maximizing the commercial value of their discoveries and inventions. He joined the firm after nearly 24 years at GlaxoSmithKline (GSK), including more than seven years as a research investigator and principal scientist, and 16 years as a patent attorney, most recently as vice president for pharmaceutical patents in the U.S.
As a leader of GSK's patent team, Duke was responsible for managing GSK's pharmaceutical research patent portfolio from target validation through early-stage clinical development across all nononcology therapy areas and a wide variety of therapeutic modalities, including small molecules, monoclonal and bispecific antibodies, antibody drug conjugates, oligonucleotides, proteolysis targeting chimeras (PROTACs), and cytotoxicity targeting chimeras (CyTaCs). He sat on the research governance boards and advised GSK's research leaders on a variety of issues, including patentability, IP strategy, portfolio building, due diligence, licensing negotiations, contract interpretation, loss of exclusivity, freedom-to-operate, and risk mitigation. As a member of GSK's global pharmaceutical patents leadership team, Duke also coordinated the training, education, and career development of attorneys throughout the company, helping to shape a high-performance culture to support GSK's research and development goals.
Earlier, Duke was responsible for GSK's oncology discovery patent portfolio, as well as advanced clinical-stage and marketed small molecule drugs, advising the oncology R&D leadership on IP strategy, patentability, freedom-to-operate, publication strategy, and licensing rights and obligations. Before that, he was the primary attorney for various patent portfolios, provided counseling to senior level R&D management on IP strategy, and was responsible for drafting and global prosecution of pharmaceutical patent applications covering a variety of new chemical entity therapeutics and a couple of marketed monoclonal antibody drugs.
Duke started his career at GSK as a principal scientist and then investigator in medicinal chemistry, where he designed, synthesized, and evaluated novel, small molecule inhibitor templates in the areas of antibiotics, antivirals, oncology, and supportive care, including the discovery of six clinical development candidates. Duke also is the co-inventor of daprodustat, approved as Jesduvroq™ in the U.S. and Duvroq™ in Japan, for the treatment of anemia associated with chronic kidney disease.
Duke is the co-inventor on several additional granted patents, is the author of numerous articles in scientific journals, and received more than a dozen awards recognizing his achievements at GSK.
Representative matters may include engagements before joining Troutman Pepper.
Sponsored Events
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New York Intellectual Property Law Association's (NYIPLA) 102nd Annual Dinner in Honor of the Federal Judiciary
Press Coverage
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GSK Exec Joins Troutman Pepper's Life Sciences IP Team
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