Although it is in the middle of very important lawsuits with some of the most powerful companies in the world, Apple was left without the leader of the division of lawyers specializing in patents. Richard Lutton Junior has decided to leave the Cupertino company, although he is more than likely actively involved in the lawsuits pending in the American courts. The information comes from the Reuters news agency, which announced that Lutton's place was taken by BJ Watrous, who is currently Vice President and Chief IP Counsel at Apple.
Apple Inc's chief patent counsel will soon leave the company, at a time when the iPhone maker is fighting numerous legal battles around the world, according to a source familiar with the situation. Apple is engaged in an expanding web of litigation concerning smartphone patents, mostly with phonemakers using Google's rival Android software. It was unclear why Richard "Chip" Lutton Junior, who manages the iPhone maker's patent portfolio, is leaving the company. However, BJ Watrous, a former deputy general counsel with Hewlett Packard, is now listed as Apple's chief IP counsel on Watrous's LinkedIn web page.
Although the loss is important for Apple, I don't think that any of the company's processes will suffer and more than likely there are other people at least as capable of hunting down and finding Apple's patents and competitors. Lately, the lawsuits filed by the company have attracted quite a lot of criticism of Apple's management, which has been accused of not "playing fair".
