Role Overview
The Head of Intellectual Property is a full-time, onsite position based in San Carlos, California, responsible for establishing and leading the entire intellectual property function from the ground up. This role suits an experienced legal professional with a technical background who is eager to protect and compound the value of groundbreaking humanoid robotics and artificial intelligence innovations.
Key Responsibilities
Create and execute a company-wide patent roadmap focused on the most defensible and commercially vital inventions across hardware, AI, and robotics.
Collaborate directly with engineering, AI, and hardware teams to surface novel technologies early and convert them into high-quality filed patents.
Build an intellectual property portfolio that ensures freedom to operate and establishes competitive leverage through targeted filing velocity, grant rates, and core technology coverage.
Perform landscape and competitive analysis to identify, recommend, and lead due diligence on strategic patent acquisitions for both offensive and defensive purposes.
Develop and implement a formal trade secret protection program, carefully deciding whether specific inventions are best safeguarded via patents or trade secrets.
Manage the IP department hands-on initially, expanding and scaling the team strictly based on company and product milestones rather than arbitrary timelines.
Requirements
Bring ten or more years of dedicated experience building and managing patent portfolios within hardware, robotics, AI, or other deep-tech industries, gained either in-house or at a premier firm.
Possess hands-on expertise in patent drafting, prosecution strategy, and portfolio management for highly complex technical inventions.
Demonstrate proven capability in executing patent landscaping, competitive assessments, and freedom-to-operate analyses.
Hold experience creating trade secret protection strategies alongside patents inside a technical organization.
Hold a technical degree in computer science, engineering, or a related discipline, paired with a solid working understanding of robotics, mechatronics, AI, or comparable systems.
Display a proven ability to partner closely with product and engineering teams to capture inventions directly at the source.
Nice to Have
Background working with intellectual property in embodied AI, autonomous systems, or humanoid robotics.
Registration to practice before the United States Patent and Trademark Office as a patent attorney or patent agent.
Familiarity with copyright, trademark, brand protection, and open-source compliance strategy.
Prior experience designing and implementing inventor incentive and disclosure programs.
Experience overseeing international filing strategies involving the PCT and key priority markets.
Skills and Tools
Deep technical fluency in AI, hardware, or robotics to communicate effectively with engineers and draft enforceable claims.
Strategic portfolio building capabilities to align all intellectual property choices with business outcomes.
Cross-functional collaboration skills to build trust successfully with external counsel, executives, and engineers.
Comfort operating autonomously in ambiguous environments by setting priorities and processes from scratch.
Salary and Benefits
Annual salary range between $270,000 and $330,000 in USD.
Comprehensive vision, medical, and dental insurance coverage.
Generous parental leave, paid time off, and company holidays.
401(k) retirement plan featuring a company match of 100 percent on the first three percent contributed and 50 percent on the next two percent.
Health Savings Accounts and Flexible Spending Accounts choices.
Transit and parking commuter benefits.
Life insurance alongside short-term and long-term disability coverage.
Employee Assistance Program offering mental health, financial, and personal support.
Onsite catered lunches and snacks.
About the Company
1X develops humanoid robots designed to perform household chores and tasks to give people time back. Operating since 2014, the company focuses on solving robotics, artificial intelligence, and manufacturing challenges simultaneously at scale, ensuring safety for home environments. Their flagship home robot, NEO, is engineered to move, learn, and operate alongside real people in the real world.
How to Apply
Apply on the official company careers page.
