Director, Litigation

Work Schedule
Standard (Mon-Fri)

Environmental Conditions
Office

Job Description

Thermo Fisher Scientific's Mission is to enable our customers to make the world healthier, cleaner, and safer. Accomplishing that Mission includes managing litigation and legal risk across Thermo Fisher businesses worldwide, in close collaboration with legal and commercial colleagues.

To support these objectives, Thermo Fisher has an exciting opportunity for experienced Litigation Counsel to:

• Lead a variety of complex civil litigations, mostly defensive and principally commercial and intellectual property matters.
• Provide strategic dispute counseling to senior legal teams and executive business leaders.
• Lead legal risk management process improvement across cross-functional teams.

This on-site role will be based at one of Thermo Fisher's offices in either Waltham, MA (Boston area), Carlsbad, CA (San Diego area), Pittsburgh, PA, or Hillsboro, OR (Portland area).

Success in this role will require strong legal advocacy, astute judgment, adaptable risk tolerance, excellent communication, and a passion for continuous learning and improvement.

Primary Responsibilities

• Lead all phases of complex civil litigation, including early case assessment through trial and appeal, with an emphasis on commercial contracts, patent infringement, trade secret misappropriation, and class action products liability.
• Develop comprehensive litigation strategies and plans, including collaborating with business legal counsel and customers to formulate goals and apply litigation expertise to drive successful resolution.
• Provide pragmatic and actionable advice to commercial and legal teams on litigation strategy, litigation risks and risk mitigation options to influence and enable successful company results.
• Supervise outside counsel and vendors, and lead budget processes, including preparing request-for-proposals (RFPs) and making alternative fee arrangements (AFAs).
• Independently manage (and as-needed perform) litigation tasks, such as drafting briefs, preparing witnesses, attending court proceedings, and negotiating settlements.
• Drive adoption of new and improved enterprise risk management processes.
• Lead or support processes to improve intellectual property protection and collaborate with internal teams to improve existing processes for same.
• Work collaboratively across organizational and geographic boundaries, building scalable processes.
• Other duties as assigned to support Thermo Fisher's Mission and the legal department.

Minimum qualifications

• 10+ years of diverse, well rounded litigation practice covering all phases of disputes. Law firm partners are encouraged to apply.
• Significant experience with at least two of the following practice areas: contract, product liability, general liability and patent and trade secret. Class action litigation experience is a plus.
• At least some courtroom and "on-feet" time is a requirement. Pro bono experience qualifies.
• Law degree and admission to and in good standing with a state bar.
• Extensive experience with client counseling, dispute resolution, and risk management.
• Strong situational awareness to adjust communication style and risk tolerance and re-calibrate strategies and recommendations around business priorities.
• Outstanding interpersonal and communication (written and verbal) skills, including tailoring communication approaches to audiences of varying legal and technical sophistication.
• Strong initiative, collaborative/team instinct, and can-do attitude.

Compensation and Benefits
The salary range estimated for this position based in Pennsylvania is $184,100.00-$240,000.00.

This position may also be eligible to receive a variable annual bonus based on company, team, and/or individual performance results in accordance with company policy. We offer a comprehensive Total Rewards package that our U.S. colleagues and their families can count on, which includes:

• A choice of national medical and dental plans, and a national vision plan, including health incentive programs
• Employee assistance and family support programs, including commuter benefits and tuition reimbursement
• At least 120 hours paid time off (PTO), 10 paid holidays annually, paid parental leave (3 weeks for bonding and 8 weeks for caregiver leave), accident and life insurance, and short- and long-term disability in accordance with company policy
• Retirement and savings programs, such as our competitive 401(k) U.S. retirement savings plan
• Employees' Stock Purchase Plan (ESPP) offers eligible colleagues the opportunity to purchase company stock at a discount

For more information on our benefits, please visit: https://jobs.thermofisher.com/global/en/total-rewards