Elana Bertram JD, MBA
College of Business - Department of Business
Assistant Professor of Management
Education:
Yale School of Management
Quinnipiac University School of Law
Biography:
Elana has a Bachelor of Arts degree in biological sciences from Mount Holyoke College, an MBA from Yale School of Management, and a Juris Doctor degree from Quinnipiac University School of Law, with concentration in intellectual property. She is a licensed attorney in the States of Connecticut and New York as well as before the United States Patent & Trademark Office, and comes to HPU with over a decade of advising and advocating for business interests, including entrepreneurs, startups, family businesses, and mid-size corporations. She served for over 2 years as a Corporator for the $1Bn AUM Newtown Savings Bank in Connecticut.
Her law practice has spanned all stages of businesses across industries, notably serving as General Counsel for the digital health solutions incubator HealthVenture, as interim General Counsel of the Multiple Myeloma Research Foundation, and advising myriad inventors, entrepreneurs, and early-stage startup companies. Her areas of focus are intellectual property portfolio management (including patent and trademark prosecution), technology transfer including government contracting, crowdfunding, venture capital and private equity, and board governance.
She is also a co-founder of Oki Nexus, Inc., a charitable organization bringing English-language learning and job skills training to low-income communities in Okinawa, Japan. Her past community service includes Vice-Chairman of the Town of Newtown Economic Development Commission from 2011-16 and the State of Connecticut Department of Energy & Environmental Protection Conservation Advisory Council.
Elana also taught for other universities including University of New Haven School of Health Sciences and University of Maryland Global Campus.
Teaching Interests
Intellectual Property
Business Law and Ethics / Advanced Business Law
Corporate Finance including Private Equity
Human Resource Management: Basic/ Advanced/ International
Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion best practices
Selected Presentations & Publications
Elana A. Bertram, What Legal Needs Alliance Managers to Know, Strategic Alliance Magazine (May 2012).
Elana A. Bertram, How to Keep your Invention Patentable while it is Stored in the Cloud: a Guide for Small Inventors, 21 Fed. Cir. B.J. 389 (2012).
Elana A. Bertram, How Current Informed Consent Protocols Flunk the Sham Surgery Test: A New Frontier in Medicine and Ethics, 14 Quinnipiac Health L.J. 131 (2010).
Carolyn Blankenship & Elana A. Bertram, Open Source Software and Patent Protection, in Open Source and Free Software 2010: Benefits, Risks and Challenges 347 (Practising Law Institute ed., 2010).
“Why There Are Too Few Women in Leadership Roles” for UMUC Diversity Council Presents: Women’s Equality Day Leadership and Beyond, August 2018.
“Military Spouses as Resources for your Business” before the American Chamber of Commerce Okinawa, November 2017.
University of Prince Edward Island School of Business, Guest Lectures in Intellectual Property presented to executive MBA classes on Strategic Planning. 2012-16.
“Know Your Assets: Patents, Trademarks, Trade Secrets, and Copyrights” on behalf of the Insurance Professionals Connection of Greater Danbury. January 2015.
“Overseas Manufacturing: an Overview of Intellectual Property and U.S. Trade Regulation Pitfalls” with David Ring, Esq. on behalf of the Connecticut Bar Association. April 2014.
“Crowdfunding and the JOBS Act: What it Means for Your Small Business Clients,” panel discussion, on behalf of the Connecticut Bar Association. January 2013.
“Employers, Employees, and Social Media in the Workplace,” panel discussion, on behalf of the Connecticut Bar Association. January 2013.
Personal
Elana is a mentor for the Blue Startups venture accelerator program in Honolulu, HI.
Her law review article How Current Informed Consent Protocols Flunk the Sham Surgery Test: A New Frontier in Medicine and Ethics was a prize-winning Finalist in the 2011 Judge John R. Brown Scholarship Foundation writing competition.
