Reid Adler

Biotechnology Advisor

Reid has been involved with innovation management in the life sciences field for over 35 years, including the development of programs and policies for various types of organizations, complex technology transactions and the strategic management of intellectual property portfolios. His legal career includes experience as a senior partner of two international law firms, Morrison & Foerster and Morgan Lewis, as well as general counsel to the pioneering J. Craig Venter Institute for genomics.

He has also consulted with several multinational pharmaceutical companies and for the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations on the legal and business development aspects of vaccines. Most recently, Reid published a website to provide courses and training resources for innovation management at (www.innovationmatters.co). His most popular course, “How to Have Safe and Effective Confidential Business Conversations” now includes a special module on “Best Practices for Negotiating in a Pandemic.” Berkeley Pharmatech members have a coupon code for free access!)

Reid was the founding director of the NIH Office of Technology Transfer, where he recruited and managed a team of over 40 people involved in translating research projects into developed health care products. He played a key role at NIH in developing policies and model agreements, research integrity guidelines and the Uniform Biological Material Transfer Agreement, currently used by hundreds of organizations worldwide. He was also the founding president of the Association of Federal Technology Transfer Executives.

He holds a J.D. from the George Washington University Law School. Following law school, he clerked for Judge Giles Rich at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. After that, he was a fellow at the Max Planck Institute for Foreign and International Patent, Copyright and Competition Law in Munich, Germany. Reid has testified before Congress on technology transfer policy, published numerous articles, and has taught courses in Innovation Management, Strategic Planning, Technology Transfer, and Legal Aspects of Biotechnology for The Johns Hopkins University, George Washington University Law School, DePaul University Law School and the FAES Graduate School at NIH. Reid also has served on the boards of several community nonprofit organizations involved with the fine arts and with middle and high-school education.