The director of the US Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO), Kathi Vidal, is to rejoin Winston & Strawn next month after she departs from her role at the helm of one of the world's largest IP offices. 

Vidal will rejoin Winston’s litigation department as a partner in its Silicon Valley and Washington DC offices 16 December, the firm said in a statement. She will also rejoin the firm's executive committee. 

The news follows Vidal announcing on LinkedIn last week that she would return to private practice and be succeeded at the USPTO by deputy director, Derrick Brent. 

Vidal was nominated to lead the agency in late 2021 by President Joe Biden while a partner at Winston, where she acted for clients including Microsoft, and was confirmed by the Senate in April 2022. 

“It has been the honour of a lifetime to serve the American public by working alongside my colleagues across government and leading the thousands of talented and dedicated employees at the US Patent and Trademark Office,” Vidal said in a statement.

Vidal added she had decided to rejoin Winston “because of its incredible team and culture, which is well-positioned to handle the issues of the future.”

Vidal had been managing partner of the firm's Silicon Valley office before joining the USPTO and upon her return is expected to assist clients in maintaining a leading edge in critical innovations, such as AI and next-generation semiconductors, as well as litigate high-stakes IP disputes, Winston said. 

Vidal first joined Winston in 2017 after nearly 20 years at IP law firm Fish & Richardson, where she rose to become global head of the 270-lawyer litigation group. At Winston she represented both plaintiffs and defendants in US district courts, the International Trade Commission and at the USPTO, according to her LinkedIn bio, and in 2018 acted for software multinational SAP in the seminal SAP v. InvestPic case regarding patent eligibility at the Federal Circuit. 

Winston's chairman, Steve D’Amore, said Vidal’s leadership was "evident not only in her outstanding tenure at the USPTO, but in the respected IP litigation capability she built at Winston and her long-standing advocacy for inclusive innovation and opportunities for all. We look forward to benefitting from her leadership experience.”

At the USPTO Vidal led a $4.2bn operation with more than 14,000 employees and worked across government on key US policy relating to AI, innovation, technological standards and international agreements and relationships, including China. 

She also served as co-chair of the National Advisory Council on Innovation and Entrepreneurship, launched the Women’s Entrepreneurship initiative with Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo and founded a start-up certification program to protect US innovation from being offshored.

In a letter to USPTO staff announcing her departure, Vidal wrote: "Together we pointed the USPTO in a new direction focused on employees and customers ... We sat at the table with our union representatives to enshrine our people-first approach into updated collective bargaining agreements for Patents and Trademarks employees, and for support staff to come. And we created the new Office of Public Engagement to expand and strengthen our outreach. I am very proud of the amazing progress we’ve made together."

Vidal's move to Winston follows Julissa Reynoso rejoining the firm earlier this year having served as ambassador to Spain and Andorra and as chief of staff to First Lady Dr. Jill Biden, the firm noted.