PRACTICE FOCUS
Jonathan Wachs provides strategic counseling and operational advice to clients in the areas of intellectual property, commercial transactions, corporate governance and the legal cannabis industry. As a member of the firm's Intellectual Property Group, Jonathan works closely with clients to develop, register, analyze, enforce,and transfer intellectual property assets. Additionally, he conducts intellectual property audits through which clients learn the nature and value of their intellectual property assets and the steps needed to protect such assets from misappropriation or dilution.
As founder of the firm’s Cannabis Law group, Jonathan is a recognized resource on issues relating to the evolving relationship between cannabis law and intellectual property protection. He has worked with many operators in the cannabis industry to navigate the rules and processes relating to specific state medical cannabis programs. Jonathan provided essential legal support to obtain required Maryland regulatory approval for the transfer of several licenses affected by a multi-billion-dollar business combination. He also facilitated a series of business transactions involving the sale, purchase and combination of integrated cannabis cultivation, processing and dispensary businesses.
As a business lawyer, Jonathan successfully negotiated and completed many seven and eight figure business transactions and has served as general counsel to several small and mid-sized businesses in various industries and professions. He manages New Paradigm Counsel, a service through which Offit Kurman delivers customized, comprehensive and cost-effective outsourced legal departments. Through New Paradigm Counsel, Jonathan served as outsourced general counsel for a government contractor, a large printing business, a payment processing company and an identity theft restoration business.
Jonathan has developed and managed numerous intellectual property portfolios, expeditiously and successfully resolved business disputes, and negotiated hundreds of business agreements. He has structured, negotiated and documented transactions regarding the formation, restructuring, sale and termination of small, mid-sized and large business entities and the acquisition, financing and transfer of business assets. He has served as counsel to various and diverse clients including cannabis industry businesses (cultivators, processors, dispensaries and independent testing laboratories), software developers, manufacturers, suppliers, real estate developers and medical practices. He has also drafted numerous agreements to license, sell and/or pledge intellectual property assets in industries including software development, entertainment, textiles food products and alcoholic beverages. Jonathan represented several manufacturers in obtaining substantial trademark and copyright infringement settlements from national and international businesses.
Prior to joining Offit Kurman as an intellectual property attorney, Jonathan worked as an antitrust lawyer at large law firms in Washington, D.C. and as a transactional business attorney in Wyomissing, Pennsylvania.
Jonathan has delivered several seminars to clients, accountants, medical professionals and the general public regarding subjects including the fundamentals of intellectual property and legal issues for startup businesses. He frequently writes on intellectual property news and issues.
RECOGNITIONS
- Martindale-Hubbell's AV Preeminent® Top Rated Lawyers
- The Best Lawyers in America®, 2023 - 2024
- Who’s Who in Cannabis, Baltimore Business Journal, 2021
- Named as one of SmartCEO’s 2010 “Legal Elite” for Baltimore and Washington, as one of the “go-to attorneys” in the areas of intellectual property law and business transactions, based on a poll of the magazine’s readers.
- Named as a 2015 and 2016 winner of a SmartCEO Center of Influence Award, dedicated to “honoring the leadership, innovation, impact, and success of the Baltimore region’s most enterprising accountants, attorneys and bankers.”
- Jonathan’ work in creating Offit Kurman’s Cannabis Law Practice earned Offit Kurman a 2016 Innovator of the Year Award from The Maryland Daily Record, which award is dedicated to honoring businesses and organizations that “have created new products, services or programs that have had a positive effect on business, industry or the community."