Mintz Adds Patent Litigator for Drug Disputes
Roberts brings Hatch-Waxman and PTAB experience to a growing life sciences patent team in New York.
Updated on Nov. 6, 2026 in Biotech
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Mintz has added Melinda Roberts as a Member in its Intellectual Property Practice in New York. Roberts joins from Venable, where she was a partner in the Intellectual Property Litigation group. This is a personnel announcement; no product, technology, or research result is involved.
Why it matters
The hire adds a litigator focused on patent disputes for pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies to Mintz's growing life sciences patent litigation team. As biologics and small-molecule drugs face more patent challenges, firms are building deeper benches for Hatch-Waxman and post-grant disputes.
The evidence here is a firm announcement rather than a measured result, so no performance figures apply. Roberts' litigation background includes Hatch-Waxman cases and proceedings before the Patent Trial and Appeal Board, and the extraction does not give outcome statistics for her matters.
The players
Mintz
A Boston-founded law firm with more than 600 attorneys across eight offices, including New York, Boston, Washington DC, and San Diego, whose life sciences practice is the focus of this hire.
Melinda Roberts
An intellectual property litigator who represents pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies and patent owners, with a prior neuroscience research background at Yale.
Venable
A Washington-based law firm whose Intellectual Property Litigation group Roberts previously led as a partner.
The details
Patent litigation in pharmaceuticals often runs through Hatch-Waxman cases, the federal framework that governs generic drug challenges, and through post-grant proceedings before the Patent Trial and Appeal Board, an administrative body that reviews the validity of issued patents. Roberts has handled disputes over biologics, which are large molecules made from living cells, as well as small-molecule drugs, which are chemically synthesized. Before her legal career she conducted neuroscience research at Yale University School of Medicine, a background that bears on the scientific side of these cases.
Timeline
Announced November 6, 2026
The Tech Race
Patent litigation over biologics and small molecules sits inside the Hatch-Waxman framework that has governed generic drug challenges since 1984. Hires like Roberts' reflect firms competing to staff that dispute work as biosimilar and biotech patent fights grow more frequent.
The hire does not change what patients or consumers experience directly. It matters most to pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies that need patent counsel for disputes over their products.
The takeaway
Watch whether Mintz names Roberts to lead specific life sciences matters in the coming months, since that would show how the team is being built out. Her stated plans to expand into biosimilars and women's health are the concrete next markers to track.
Further reading
For background on the research and policy shaping drug development, see Biotech coverage in New York City.
Source note: This article includes information reported by Globallegalchronicle.
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