Nikita Stepin practises in all areas of commercial technology and intellectual property law with a focus on providing legal advice and services relating to corporate and commercial transactions involving technology and intellectual property rights, including the negotiation and drafting of software as a service agreements, technology sales agreements, research and development agreements and intellectual property licences among other technology-related contracts in the context of complex technology transactions and other strategic alliances.

He has acted on both sides of multinational mergers and acquisitions, patent purchases and sales, and licensing and IP transactions. He also works closely with our corporate attorneys on mergers, acquisitions, and spin-outs to structure the transfer and protection of technology and intellectual property assets. Nikita also has a strong background in intellectual property litigation before the Federal Court of Canada and Federal Court of Appeal.

His practice also extends to advising clients on compliance with all Canadian federal and provincial privacy and data management laws, cybersecurity breaches and reporting, data protection and negotiating the intellectual property aspects of corporate mergers and acquisitions, including with respect to insurance coverage on intellectual property, IT, privacy and various technology aspects.

Nikita completed a secondment at the legal division of Pfizer Canada Inc., where he worked directly for the general counsel and vice-president, legal and his team on a wide variety of  commercial mandates, allowing him to gain a unique understanding of what our clients need from their external counsel. He has particular experience with complex pharmaceutical and medical-device patent infringement and impeachment actions.

In law school, Nikita was involved in researching and editing several intellectual property-related theses and publications for McGill University's Centre for Intellectual Property Policy and in managing and organizing symposiums and seminars. He also acted as research and teaching assistant for the McGill University Intellectual Property course, volunteered at the McGill Legal Information Clinic and served as external ambassador for the Faculty of Law.

He frequently publishes posts on the Norton Rose Fulbright blog pertaining to recent developments in copyright and patent law.