Associate Corporate Counsel – Legal Product, IP, and Marketing Contract

What is The Role

We are looking for an innovative and curious Corporate Counsel to help shape how Elastic’s technologies are built, protected, and brought to market. Elastic is distributed-by-design  and this role can be located in the United States or Canada, reporting to the Vice President of Legal Innovation (Product, IP, Marketing) with dotted line supervision by the Director of Legal Innovation. You will work alongside product and engineering teams from initial ideation through product launch, supporting legal design advice on features at the cutting edge of enterprise technology, helping the company to scale at velocity. The role assists with day-to-day in-house innovation and patent prosecution management.  It carries a broad set of additional product counsel responsibilities collaborating with other legal team members to address AI governance, open-source licensing, dependency management, trademark and brand protection, baseline trade compliance backup, and commercial enablement. We're looking for a resourceful early career attorney with a roll-up-your-sleeves demeanor and the ability to navigate the intersection of law and emerging technology.

What You Will Be Doing

This is a dynamic role for a proactive advocate who enjoys finding solutions and bringing velocity to quality outcomes. In this capacity, you will:

Patent Prosecution & Invention Harvesting: Support Elastic's day-to-day patent prosecution and innovation motions. Develop a deep working knowledge of Elastic's product technology and roadmap. Assist in operating the invention harvesting and patent intake program by working with other Elasticians to identify innovative ideas, evaluate inventions for patentability, and prepare or review patent disclosures. You will support and assist more senior legal team members and stakeholders in working with outside patent counsel, help identify and prioritize IP filings in line with portfolio strategy, and support value creation and efficiencies in IP portfolio management.

IP Portfolio Management: Working closely with the Director of Legal for Product and IP, help manage Elastic's global patent, copyright, and trademark portfolios, including trademark monitoring and clearance, copyright registrations, and tracking all filing, prosecution, and renewal deadlines across jurisdictions.

Brand Protection & Enforcement: Support IP enforcement strategies by assisting with domain name disputes, social media takedowns, and coordination with vendors and outside counsel on pre-litigation disputes and assertions.

Product Regulatory Governance & Product Launch Readiness: Coordinate with cross-functional team members, including Legal Privacy and Commercial, Information Security, and IT to support our Product build and release functions.  Support ongoing improvements to related internal guidelines as necessary to ensure all Elasticians are operating efficiently and effectively within the productization and go-to-market functions.

Open-Source & Product Counseling: Assist in managing day-to-day open-source software licensing and compliance programs, ensuring inbound third-party dependencies align with our outbound strategy. Support in the creation of advice and assistance for engineering and product management teams on intellectual property rights, open-source licensing, AI modelopen weight licensing, dependencies generally, and data collection/usage risks.

Commercial Contracts & Playbooks: Review, research, and prepare first drafts of commercial contract clauses related to AI, IP, Product, dependencies, and open-source software—including data rights and warranties.  Support in the updating of legal playbooks to reflect shifting industry standards with the Commercial Legal Team.

Legal Research & Diligence: Support in and conduct factual and legal research, organize complex documentation for technology partnerships, M&A diligence, and legal disputes in a distributed environment.

Trade Compliance Support: Develop a foundational understanding of Elastic's product and its technical intricacies to provide backup support to our core trade compliance team. Learn to analyze and help apply export laws, such as the Export Administration Regulations (EAR), specifically as they relate to our product capabilities and software portfolio.

What You Bring

• Experience: 2–5+ years of experience in patent prosecution and/or litigation and intellectual property or product law, preferably with exposure to the software industry. SaaS, enterprise data platforms, or open-source products.
• Technical Background: A bachelor's or advanced degree in a science or engineering field. Experience in or academic background in software engineering is a strong plus.
• Credentials: Admission to the US or Canadian Patent Bar (registration number required). A JD from a US law school or LLB from a Canadian law school preferred, but patent agents are eligible. 
• Patent Proficiency: Demonstrated experience drafting, reviewing, or managing patent applications, with the ability to translate complex technical concepts into clear patent claims and legal analysis.
• Technical Curiosity: A demonstrated interest in Generative Artificial Intelligence and the legal frameworks governing code and data.
• Problem-Solving: A self-starting, proactive approach with the poise to prioritize multiple projects and recalibrate advice as priorities shift.
• Communication: Excellent written and oral communication skills, with the ability to take complex legal and technical concepts and simplify the issues and desired outcomes.
• Aptitude for Trade Compliance: A strong curiosity and willingness to learn trade compliance frameworks and analyze export law in relation to technical product details; prior trade compliance experience is not required.

Bonus Points

• Process Perspective: A desire to build and strengthen workflows and "productization" processes that help a legal team scale.
• Global Perspective: Comfortable working across time zones and cultures in a distributed culture with a flexible approach to problem-solving.