Nelson Dong

Nelson Dong is a partner in the Seattle office of Dorsey & Whitney LLP, a 750-attorney international law firm. He represents technology companies in venture capital financing, technology transfer and distribution agreements and other domestic and international technology and intellectual property transactions. He has substantial experience in counseling e-commerce, semiconductor, electronics, computer hardware and software, and biomedical and biotechnology companies with special expertise in domestic and international technology licensing and U.S. export control matters. He is also co-chair of the firm’s Internet and E-Commerce Legal Practice Group.

He has frequently written about intellectual property law, U.S. export control law, technology-related business transactions between the U.S. and Asian or European countries, international strategic alliances, the Exon-Florio law on foreign investments in U.S. technology companies, university-based technology transfer, academic entrepreneurship, academic conflicts of interest and the financing and organization of high technology businesses. He has lectured on such topics throughout the United States and in Austria, Canada, England, the Netherlands, Hong Kong and the People’s Republic of China.

He served as a member of the President’s Export Council Subcommittee on Export Administration, the nation’s highest advisory group on U.S. export control policy (1999-2001). He has been active in the American Bar Association’s Section of International Law and Practice and previously served on the Executive Committee of the California State Bar’s Section on International Law. Nelson has been President of the TechLaw Group (1996-98), an international consortium of leading law firms that serve high technology clients.

Nelson also served as an Assistant U.S. Attorney in Boston, Massachusetts (1980-82); Deputy Associate Attorney General, Department of Justice, Washington, D.C. (1979-80); and White House Fellow and Special Assistant to U.S. Attorney General Griffin B. Bell, Department of Justice, Washington, D.C. (1978-79).

He received his J.D. from Yale Law School (1974) and his A.B. in economics from Stanford University (1971). He has been a member of the Stanford University Board of Trustees (1978-82).