Intellectual Property Attorney in Dallas, TX

An intellectual property attorney in Dallas protects the four things a business owns but cannot lock up: inventions, brand names, creative work, and confidential know-how. Leavitt and Eldredge covers all four, from USPTO filing through litigation in the Northern District of Texas, at flat fees quoted in writing.

Start with the asset, not the label

Most people arrive knowing they have something worth protecting and not knowing which of the four systems protects it. The four are not interchangeable, they cost different amounts, and picking the wrong one is how businesses end up paying for protection that does not cover the thing they were worried about. The question is always what the asset is.

What you have	What protects it	What you get
A machine, a device, a process, a formulation, a functional improvement	Patent	The right to stop others making, using, or selling it, for a limited term
A business name, a product name, a logo, a slogan	Trademark	A nationwide claim to that identifier for your goods and services, renewable indefinitely
Writing, photography, video, music, artwork, software code, architectural plans	Copyright	Control over copying, distribution, and derivative works, for decades
A method, recipe, formula, or customer list that is valuable because it is not public	Trade secret	Protection for as long as you keep it secret, with no filing and no expiry date

One product routinely needs several. A consumer device can carry a patent on the mechanism, a trademark on the name, a copyright on the manual and packaging artwork, and a trade secret in the manufacturing tolerances that make it work. Deciding which of those are worth paying for, and in what order, is the first conversation we have with a Dallas client.

What we look at first

A free consultation with our firm is not a sales call with a form. It is a short inventory:

What do you own that a competitor would want. Usually it is more than the obvious thing, and occasionally the obvious thing is not the valuable one.
What is already exposed. A product shown publicly, a name in use without a filing, code written by a contractor with no written assignment. Exposure sets the urgency.
Who actually owns it on paper. Work produced by contractors, co-founders, or a previous company does not belong to your business by default. This is where diligence deals fall apart.
What is coming. A launch date, a trade show, an investor conversation, or an expansion into a new market changes which filing has to happen first.

That produces an order of operations and a written quote. You are free to take it elsewhere.

Why the Dallas market makes this urgent

North Texas is one of the country’s more productive regions for new intellectual property. The USPTO issues on the order of 100 to 150 patents a week to North Texas inventors, and Dallas sits among the top dozen United States metros for patent output. That concentration cuts both ways. Dense innovation means a strong local market for licensing and enforcement, and it also means a much higher chance that your technology or your brand overlaps with a claim somebody else has already filed.

Practically, it means two things for a Dallas business. Search before you file, because the odds of a collision here are not theoretical. And file earlier than feels necessary, because the United States awards patents to the first applicant to file, not the first person to invent.

One firm from the filing to the courtroom

Intellectual property law is our entire practice, not one department among many. Our senior partner, Richard Eldredge, is a licensed Professional Engineer and a USPTO-registered patent attorney, registered with the Patent and Trademark Office since 2008. Our managing partner, Brandon Leavitt, is a published biochemist and a federal court litigator admitted in all four Texas federal district courts, with arguments before federal district courts, the Federal Circuit, and the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board. Between them the firm carries more than thirty years of combined experience.

The practical consequence is the absence of a handoff. The attorney who drafts and prosecutes your filing is in the same firm as the attorney who would enforce it, so an infringement dispute does not begin with a new retainer and weeks of bringing a stranger up to speed on your technology and your prosecution history.

Fees you can plan around

We quote flat fees in writing before work starts, across the board: $1,200 for a federal trademark, $2,000 for a provisional patent application, $5,000 for a nonprovisional, and $1,600 to form a Texas LLC. Payment by installment is available. Full detail is on the cost and fees page. If you are weighing several Dallas firms against each other, our page on choosing an IP attorney in Dallas sets out what actually separates them.

Where to start

If the asset is an invention, go to patents in Dallas. If it is a name or a logo, go to trademarks in Dallas. If it is creative or written work, go to copyright in Dallas. If you are not sure, that is the normal case and the consultation is free.

Our Dallas office is at 3838 Oak Lawn Avenue, Suite 1000, Dallas, TX 75219, on the corner of Oak Lawn Avenue and Blackburn Street. Call 844-728-3680 or the Dallas line on 817-522-4035, Monday to Friday, 8am to 8pm CST.

Common questions

Frequently asked

Which kind of intellectual property protection do I actually need?

It depends on what you are protecting, not on what you call it. A functional invention is a patent question. A name, logo, or slogan is a trademark question. Written work, photography, software code, music, and design are copyright questions. A process or customer list that gives you an edge because nobody else knows it is a trade secret question. Most businesses need two or three of the four.

Can one firm handle all four types?

Not every firm can. Patent work requires an attorney who has passed the separate USPTO patent bar and is registered to practise before the office, which is a different credential from a law licence. Our senior partner is a licensed Professional Engineer and a USPTO-registered patent attorney, and the firm handles trademarks, copyrights, and trade secrets alongside patents rather than referring them out.

What does intellectual property protection cost in Dallas?

Our flat fees are $1,200 for a federal trademark, $2,000 for a provisional patent application, $5,000 for a nonprovisional patent application, and $1,850 for a Texas LLC formation. Every quote is in writing before work starts, and payment by installment is available. Disputes are scoped and quoted separately rather than billed on an open hourly meter.

Do you litigate intellectual property cases in Dallas?

Yes. Federal IP cases from Dallas are heard in the Northern District of Texas. Brandon Leavitt is admitted to practise in all four Texas federal district courts and has argued before federal district courts, the Federal Circuit, and the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board, so an enforcement matter stays with the firm that already knows the file.

When is the right time to talk to an IP attorney?

Before you spend money that becomes hard to unwind. Before the packaging run, before the product launch, before a public demonstration or a trade show, and before you hand a design to a contractor without a written assignment. Patents in the United States go to the first person to file, and a public disclosure can start a clock you cannot restart.