Vice President,
White Plains
Antitrust and Intellectual
Property Practices
PhD in Economics,
MIT
The NERA environment in ten words or less:
The highest quality economic research conducted in a collegial environment.
On choosing a practice area:
I specialize in applied microeconomic analysis, which includes areas such as antitrust economics, the economics of intellectual property, and commercial damages. I chose this area because the analytical questions are interesting, the data to which we have access are far richer than what is typically available for academic research, and the outcomes of our analyses are important for firm decision-making, policy, and real world litigation and agency results.
On a typical week:
A typical week can vary quite dramatically for me. During some weeks, I am focused on data analysis and econometrics. During other weeks, my focus is on writing a report or white paper to report on my analysis. In some weeks, I spend a lot of time interviewing business people to understand industry dynamics and their firms' strategies. My work covers a wide range of topic areas, to include evaluations of the competitive effects of mergers and acquisitions, analysis of antitrust claims such as monopolization and resale price maintenance, and calculation of economic damages in cases involving antitrust claims, patent damages, and breaches of contract. I have written expert reports and testified in deposition and at trial about my economic analysis. So depending on the issue or the project, my time in any given week can be spent on one of a variety of interesting tasks.
On the fascinating aspects of this field:
Court decisions often change the types of analytical questions that our clients need help answering and the methodologies used. For example, the appeals court for patent matters recently clarified the proper way of measuring patent damages, to make the analysis more economically sound. At NERA, we help our clients to understand how those changes affect them and how to implement the new analyses in litigation. Things are constantly changing, and it's up to us to develop new approaches.
On my career progression:
As a consultant, my focus was mainly internal, overseeing researchers and developing models. As I have advanced in the firm, my focus and responsibilities have gradually changed to encompass more externally focused tasks, such as interviewing business people, describing our work to attorneys, and interviewing for new potential projects. NERA is a firm filled with very smart, very dedicated people who also happen to have a high degree of collegiality and a commitment to mentoring. That combination is wonderful and unique, and has made all the difference in my professional growth.
