Baltimore County to donate $75,000 for legal center

Baltimore County (Map, News) - Baltimore County officials are expected to pledge $75,000 today to support a new legal resource center that provides law students opportunities to counsel budding technology entrepreneurs and their businesses.

The center, staffed by University of Maryland law students, opened at the University of Maryland Baltimore County’s technology incubator park in June and provides contract review and drafting advice, legal audits, patents and shareholder agreements, among other services.

The center is the only law school program of its kind in the county situated in a technology park, officials said, and the law students are available to all county businesses, officials said.

“This program puts the skills of bright, young legal students to work for all of us,” said Baltimore County Executive Jim Smith in a statement. Smith will be joined by UMBC President Freeman Hrabowski and Frederick Provorny, who directs the Maryland Intellectual Property Legal Resource Center, at an announcement today. Representatives of successful businesses that have graduated from the incubator are also expected to attend.

One such firm is InVitro Technologies, which recently sold for more than $30 million and remains in the university’s business accelerator program. Most of the park’s 40 firms specialize in biotechnology, life sciences and information technology, said director of marketing and business development Tammie Thomas.

“This is a great success story for us,” Thomas said. “When you add in the Baltimore County funding, it’s the merging of government, academia and business.”

jmalarkey@baltimoreexaminer.com

Advertisement