Intellectual property (“IP”) involves laws to protect the rights of creators and owners of inventions, writing, music, designs, and other works. Grounded in Article I, Section 8 of the United States Constitution, IP law includes patent law, copyright law, trademark law, and trade secret law. IP law fosters innovation in fields ranging from pharmaceuticals and computers to art and music. Women have made up 50 percent of all students graduating from law school for many years but are underrepresented in Intellectual Property (IP) law. Only 22 percent of people registered with the United States Patent and Trademark Office (a qualification required to write patents) are women. One of the reasons for this underrepresentation is a pipeline problem: a baccalaureate or advanced degree in a technical field is required to practice many types of IP law and is a helpful background for others, and women continue to receive proportionally fewer STEM degrees than men. The purpose of the Karen I. Boyd Women in Intellectual Property Pipeline Scholarship is to address this issue, especially in first generation and other underrepresented populations served by California State University, Northridge.
Karen Boyd received her baccalaureate degree in biology from California State University, Northridge in 1990. In 2008, she founded the law firm Turner Boyd, which became one of the best-regarded IP litigation boutiques in Silicon Valley and the largest woman-owned patent litigation boutique in the country. Turner Boyd joined the national general practice law firm Thompson Hine in 2026 and the Turner Boyd lawyers continue to represent clients from all over the world in courts throughout the United States. Clients range from household-name technology companies, to consumer product companies, to biotechnology companies at the forefront of medical innovation. These IP attorneys have undergraduate degrees in biology, materials science, biomedical engineering, computer science, physics, and electrical engineering, as well as psychology, music, international relations, Spanish, philosophy, political science, and creative writing. Following her degree in biology from CSUN, Karen Boyd went on to receive her master’s degree in molecular biology from UCLA and her law degree from U.C. Berkeley in 1996. Through her scholarship fund, she hopes to support others at CSUN in following this rewarding career path.
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