IP Paralegal

Perplexity AI is looking for a highly organized and resourceful IP Paralegal to serve as the operational backbone of a fast-growing, full-stack intellectual property program.

The successful candidate will partner closely with outside counsel, engineering stakeholders, and cross-functional teams to run the workflows behind a growing patent and trademark portfolio, maintain copyright and trade secret practices, and support open source compliance review.

Key Responsibilities:

• Manage end-to-end workflows across the patent and trademark portfolios, including docketing, deadline tracking, filing coordination, portfolio maintenance, and status reporting to internal stakeholders.
• Support trade secret protection practices and open source compliance review, including tracking disclosure and license obligations and flagging issues for attorney review.
• Administer copyright matters, including registration filings, recordation, and portfolio record keeping.
• Own intake and triage for new invention disclosures, trademark clearance requests, and other IP matters.
• Manage outside counsel relationships and billing, including matter budgets, accrual tracking, invoice review against outside counsel guidelines, rate negotiation support, and matter-management hygiene in billing systems.
• Run the patent rewards program.
• Prepare and file U.S. trademark applications and coordinate foreign filings through local counsel.
• Run preliminary clearance searches for new products and features.
• Coordinate trademark office action responses, review watch notices, and recommend enforcement actions.
• Manage the domain name portfolio and the online brand protection and takedown programs.
• Conduct IP portfolio analysis, including filing trend tracking, competitive landscape monitoring, and gap identification, to support portfolio strategy and prosecution priorities.
• Provide support on IP-adjacent matters as needed, including commercial contract IP terms and litigation support.
• Maintain and improve internal file management systems, trackers, and dashboards, keeping matter data, deadlines, and portfolio status current and audit-ready.
• Build and improve the systems behind the work, including intake workflows, filing playbooks, matter templates, and escalation paths.
• Use and help evolve agentic AI tools to support IP workflows.

Qualifications:

• 10+ years of experience as an IP paralegal, with a mix of in-house and law firm experience.
• Demonstrated AI tool fluency and genuine curiosity about applying agentic AI systems to IP program operations.
• Hands-on experience supporting a mix of patent and trademark prosecution workflows.
• Working knowledge of copyright administration and trade secret protection practices.
• Experience managing outside counsel relationships.
• Experience managing a high volume of concurrent matters and deadlines with strong organizational skills and exacting attention to detail.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills.
• Demonstrated discretion and sound judgment when handling confidential and privileged material.

Nice to have:

• Paralegal certificate, associate's degree in paralegal studies, or bachelor's degree.
• Direct experience with open source license compliance review.
• Experience running or supporting an inventor recognition or patent rewards/incentive program.
• Experience supporting IP diligence for M&A, financing, or commercial transactions.
• Litigation support experience.
• Experience with IP portfolio analytics.
• Direct experience with docketing platforms, IP management software, and legal billing or matter management systems.
• Experience at a high-growth technology startup.
• Interest in artificial intelligence laws and regulations.