Mark S. Sparschu is the head of Brooks Kushman's trademark practice, a position in which he is privileged to work with a talented and diverse team of trademark professionals.

Prior to joining Brooks Kushman in 2009, Mark had fifteen years of intellectual property experience. His most recent position was Chief Trademark Counsel of Ford Motor Company, where he had overall responsibility for the worldwide trademark law matters of Ford and its affiliated brands, including Lincoln, Mercury, Jaguar, Land Rover, Volvo and Aston Martin. In that position, he led Ford’s international team of in-house trademark professionals and outside counsel throughout the world. He and his team had global responsibility for clearance, filing and prosecution of trademark applications as well as trademark enforcement, licensing, transactions and litigation.

Prior to Mark’s position as Chief Trademark Counsel of Ford, he was Chief Patent and Trademark Counsel at Volvo Car Corporation in Göteborg, Sweden. He established the intellectual property department from the ground up shortly after Ford’s acquisition of Volvo Cars. Mark and his team were responsible for all global intellectual property matters for Volvo Cars. Within this responsibility were patent application filing and prosecution in the European, Swedish and United States patent offices as well as prosecution of patent applications filed under the Patent Cooperation Treaty. Mark handled several high-profile intellectual property transactions, including the divestiture of Volvo Cars’ manual transmission business and the creation of a joint venture that manufactures the Volvo C70 coupe-convertible. Mark also led targeted and successful trademark litigation that resulted in favorable agreements which protect the Volvo Cars vehicle nomenclature system from third-party threats.

Mark has also served as Patent Counsel at Ford, where he was responsible for drafting and prosecuting patent applications in the electrical, electronic and electromechanical arts, in addition to managing outside counsel. He also has significant experience in technology licensing, development agreements and other technology transactions.

Before beginning to practice law, Mark spent ten years at General Motors Corporation where, as a senior electrical engineer, he was responsible for advanced and production projects in the automotive navigation, mobile communications, body control electronics, anti-lock brake and traction control fields.

Mark has had the opportunity to speak on the issues of protection of heritage trademarks, strategic considerations in unrelated parties’ sharing of a common trademark, trade dress protection and, to the Swedish Anti-Counterfeiting Group in Stockholm, the future of industrial design.

Mark brings a broad range of legal, technical and international experience and responsibility to Brooks Kushman’s intellectual property practice. He is ideally equipped to act as a partner in helping our clients use intellectual property to meet their business goals.