TIPLA SPRING 2026 CLE PROGRAM

TN Intellectual Property Law Association

Get ready to boost your legal skills and network with pros at this spring CLE program!

Law Offices of Bradley Arant Boult Cummings

Please join us for the TIPLA Spring 2026 CLE Seminar- a must-attend event for legal professionals looking to stay ahead in IP law! TIPLA SPRING 2026 FACULTY Dawn Jackson is an associate in the Bradley's Litigation Practice Group. She earned her J.D. (magna cum laude) from the University of Mississippi School of Law in 2024. While in law school, she was a Bobby Wood Clinical Programs Award Recipient. Dawn also received a B.B.A. (summa cum laude) in Economics and B.A. (summa cum laude) in Foreign Languages from Mississippi State University. She is licensed in Tennessee. Josh Kleppin is an associate in Bradley's Litigation Practice Group. Josh graduated first in his class and received his J.D. (summa cum laude) from Belmont University College of Law, where he was executive development and technology editor of the Belmont Law Review. His note, Making a Deliberate Difference: Creating a Constitutional Solution to Hepatitis C in Prisons, was published in Vol. 8, Issue 1 of that journal. Josh also served as the president of Belmont’s Board of Advocates and was active on the Moot Court team. Josh was the chief brief writer for two national competition teams. In 2020, his team was a Chicago Regional Champion in the American Bar Association’s National Appellate Advocacy Competition. The team reached the national finals of that competition, finishing second overall and earning accolades for the 5th Best Brief.While in law school, Josh interned as a clerk for the Hon. Chief Justice Jeffrey S. Bivins on the Tennessee Supreme Court and Judge Kelvin D. Jones in the State of Tennessee’s 20th Judicial District. A.J. Bahou is practice leader of Bradley's Artificial Intelligence (AI) and an intellectual property attorney who focuses on the intersection of law and technology. He has extensive experience in the areas of electrical and computer engineering technologies, including AI, virtual reality, medical devices, computer hardware, blockchain, software, and internet security systems. With 20 years of experience, A.J. handles the full spectrum of transactions, diligence, and intellectual property litigation, from pre-complaint investigation through trial and appeal in matters involving patents, copyrights, trademarks, trade secrets, and commercial disputes. Anthony (Tony) Schlehuber is an associate general counsel at Vanderbilt University. In his role as Associate General Counsel, Anthony Schlehuber is responsible for intellectual property matters across the university, ranging from research and innovation to copyrights to trademarks. Anthony additionally provides counsel on data privacy issues and international contracting. Anthony’s expertise has helped navigate Vanderbilt staff and faculty through the ever-changing world of research compliance and grant funding and he has advised the university as it enters a new era of college athletics. Clay Rigsby is an associate at Cipriani &amp; Werner in the firm's Atlanta office. He is a 2025 graduate of the University of Tennessee Winston College of Law, where he was a two-time student advocate on the Saul Lefkowitz Trademark Moot Court team. As a USPTO-registered student attorney with the College of Law’s Transactional Law Clinic, he helped small business clients obtain protection for their trademarks. His legal interests include new developments in copyright and trademark law, as well as IP litigation. He is licensed in Georgia and Florida. Paulluvi Henley is a registered patent attorney and an associate in Baker Donelson's Nashville office as a member of the Intellectual Property Group. She focuses on patent prosecution and represents clients in intellectual property litigation and protection matters. Clients trust Mrs. Henley to guide them through each step of creation and maintenance of intellectual property portfolios and preparation of intellectual property agreements. She works with clients on patent and trademark preparation and prosecution. Samuel (Sam) Raque, an associate at Patterson IP, is a Registered U.S. Patent Attorney. He concentrates his practice in the areas of intellectual property protection, including patent prosecution, counseling clients on their intellectual property portfolios, patent infringement, and the litigation of intellectual property law matters. Bibiana Agudelo is the managing partner of BBA IP, an international intellectual property firm with a focus Colombia and Mexico. She has been practicing in the trademark field for 28 years at top trademark practices of firms in Bogota, Colombia and New York City. She has also served as an in-house trademark counsel at PepsiCo. Her experience includes management of Latin American as well as worldwide trademark portfolios, enforcement and anti-counterfeiting matters in Colombia, Mexico and the United States. Bibiana is a licensed attorney in Colombia and Mexico, with an LLM in Intellectual Property in the U.S. (Franklin Pierce Law Center, today University of New Hampshire).

Agenda

Welcome and Breakfast

This presentation will provide attendees with an overview of recent and pending developments in intellectual property legislation. It will focus on IP legislation that passed and bills that were introduced in 2025. Some of the main topics that will be covered are copyright-related legislation/bills, AI legislation/bills, federal preemption, and trademark litigation.

IP Legislation Update

The USPTO, as part of its “steadfast commitment to dramatically improve examination quality,” has launched its Artificial Intelligence Search Automated Pilot (“ASAP!”) to integrate AI tools into its application review workflow. What does this mean for practitioners and our clients? And given it seems every month brings another horror story of a law firm’s AI use gone astray, what can we learn from the USPTO and the experiences of others about how to employ AI the right way? 


Ethical use of AI: If the USPTO is leveraging an AI toolkit, how can I?

Morning Break

This presentation examines how generative AI is reshaping intellectual property law across copyrights, patents, trademarks, and design rights, focusing on what remains protectable when AI is involved. It reviews current guidance from the United States Patent and Trademark Office and the U.S. Copyright Office, along with emerging case law addressing authorship, inventorship, confidentiality, and privilege in the AI context. The program then provides practical strategies for in-house and outside counsel to manage risks related to disclosure, derivative works, and AI-assisted development while preserving IP rights.


Human Creativity, Machine Assistance: Protecting IP in the Generative AI Era

Lunch

The concept of a character as an individual copyright is a recognized and developing, yet complex and often foggy, body of law. When a copyrighted work enters the public domain, characters within it that are distinct enough to have their own copyright protection fall into the public domain alongside their parent work. However, the current state of copyright law allows for an older iteration of a character to be in the public domain but a newer iteration of that same character to exist under a separate copyright - even if those two iterations are, in reality, the exact same character with a new coat of paint. This presentation seeks to identify the dissonance and contradictions within pre-existing character copyright law and suggest a new way of thinking about character copyright that tethers the copyright protection of all iterations of the same fundamental character to one original root copyright. 


Copyright, Incremental Originality, and a New Approach to Character Copyright

This presentation will focus on international trademark enforcement and counterfeiting issues. 

Mexico:Important and Challenging Jurisdiction to Protect and Enforce TM Rights

Afternoon Break

While design patents may sometimes be characterized as one of the “other” types of IP protection when compared against their utility brethren, protection of product design remains a critical consideration in a well-rounded patent portfolio. Further, the USPTO’s recent “supplemental guidance” on patenting computer-generated interfaces and icons hints at the growing demand to patent the appearance of the screens we interact with every day, creating new questions of fact and law for design patents. In addition, recent court decisions have been issued, further developing the new test for obviousness after the LKQ decision, as well as further distinction in infringement analyses, patentability in light of prosecution history, parallel utility filings, construction, and scope. The most effective practitioners will be those that incorporate these new tools and prosecution and litigation tips, while avoiding emerging pitfalls in technology and law.


TIPLA SPRING 2026 CLE PROGRAM

More events from TN Intellectual Property Law Association

Discover more events from TN Intellectual Property Law Association, from Business to other experiences you might love.

Still looking for the right event?

Explore all events in Nashville and filter by date, category, and more to find the perfect fit.

TIPLA SPRING 2026 CLE PROGRAM

More events from TN Intellectual Property Law Association

Discover more events from TN Intellectual Property Law Association, from Business to other experiences you might love.

You might also like...

Browse more events with different dates, prices, and formats to find your next great experience.

Still looking for the right event?

Explore all events in Nashville and filter by date, category, and more to find the perfect fit.