Las Vegas, Now Focusing on Intellectual Property
Las Vegas was one of the major American cities to be hit hardest by the global recession of 2008. People aren’t in a hurry to gamble away what little money they have in a depression, and this substantially affected Las Vegas tourism for the past couple of years. However, it seems that the famous city is finally starting to get itself back on track by focusing on intellectual property and commercial real estate. The focus on commercial real estate doesn’t seem to be particularly new for Vegas; the city has been well-known for its multiple iconic hotel/casinos that are always being added to the famous Vegas Strip, so it seems safe to assume that commercial real estate has always been a pretty important industry for the city. However, the new focus on intellectual property is a fascinating development for the self-styled Entertainment Capital of the World.
These newly developing intellectual property holdings are actually similar to current business models present in Las Vegas, as the focus pertains largely to online gaming experiences. Most of these games are currently geared towards a sort of online version of the gambling present in Sin City but experts hope that the market can diversify and become home to a myriad of different games. Many believe that this will be easy to achieve and some notable intellectual property lawyers have pointed out that while the current sector in Las Vegas may not be as big as New York’s or LA’s, Nevada has always been near the front of the intellectual property development scene and was even the first state to legalize online gambling thus allowing for online gambling trademarks to be developed in Nevada, specifically in Las Vegas, before anywhere else. Clearly the state in general and Las Vegas in particular is committed to growing its intellectual property field, and with such commitment to innovation, it is only a matter of time before a serious intellectual property sector emerges that could eventually rival that of an internationally renowned city like San Francisco.
After all, these new gaming businesses bring in new tech developers to design new systems for the games, and these in turn bring in patent and trademark lawyers to help protect developing businesses’ various assets. Jennifer Ko Craft, the head of the intellectual property division of one of Las Vegas’s biggest gaming companies, said that during the worst years of the recession she worked constantly and almost exclusively to enforce infringements on existing patents, but now that the economy is on the rise, she sees far more clients coming to find help with patenting new ideas than seeking infringement suits. The focus of the Las Vegas intellectual property industry has shifted to the creation of new patents rather than pursuing infringement, undoubtedly a sign that the economy has significantly recovered there. This doesn’t surprise Director Bo Bernhard of the International Gaming Institute at the University of Nevada in Las Vegas. He says gaming has always been important to Las Vegas but that recently the city has cemented itself as one of the most important cities of the gaming world. It’s no surprise that new ideas and new patents are exploding now that Las Vegas has proven itself and is starting to become a dominant force in the gaming world.
These expansions of business have been incredibly successful and the market is currently booming there. Some experts are so confident in the economic expansion that they are even optimistically predicting that Las Vegas could become Nevada’s own version of California’s famous Silicon Valley within the next several years. After all, supporters are quick to point out, Las Vegas can’t survive on video games alone; other technologies need to be developed as well. For now the new business model seems to be successful for Las Vegas and shows no signs of slowing any time soon. So with the demand for experienced intellectual property lawyers on the rise and vastly outstripping the current supply, the next few years will be great for aspiring intellectual property lawyers in Nevada.
Kevin James
Intern at
JAFARI LAW GROUP®, INC.