Michelle A. Cooke

Cooke is co-chair of Manatt’s IP group, a member of the firm’s board of directors and of its strategic growth and recruiting committee and chair of the diversity committee. She advises companies navigating global market expansion, brand development and entrance onto the digital landscape. And she represents those facing complex, multijurisdictional trademark disputes.

Her clients include school and office supply brand Yoobi Trading Corp. Ltd.; Eurostar Inc., which runs the WWS retail shoe store chain; and Public Media Group of Southern California.

She’s seen the practice change dramatically since the 1990s.

“IP was not what it is now. When I went to law school, I never took an IP class,” Cooke said. “I started as a general commercial litigator, but I quickly found I wanted to own an area of law.”

“I saw signs that IP would be a wave of the future, given the rapid rise in innovations and the increased reliance of businesses on their intellectual property rights,” she added. “I didn’t know what a trademark was, but it sounded like a transformative legal area was calling my name.”

For client Eurostar, the parent of the WSS apparel and footwear maker, Cooke has handled a wide range of issues.

They include copyright and trademark disputes, brand development, IP challenges related to social media, privacy, data security, advertising, rebranding and brand revitalization as well as protection against counterfeits.

She said she works closely with the company’s senior leadership to align IP needs with business activities and growth plans.

In 2020, she negotiated a settlement and a trademark coexistence agreement with a large international retailer to smooth WSS’s entry into certain overseas markets.

“It can be a matter of knitting together global strategies to translate U.S. brands to an overseas presence,” she said. “Eurostar started in California, and it’s a civic-minded company that has partnered with Nike. It’s grown into a 100-store operation with interesting IP challenges.”

At one point, she and her Manatt team initiated proceedings against a National Basketball Association player whom Cooke declined to name regarding trademarks WSS felt were confusingly similar to one of its marks.

Cooke developed the strategy for the dispute proceedings and subsequent negotiations. The player agreed to drop the disputed marks.

“We made it clear that we weren’t going to go away,” she said. “We convinced them they could spend their money elsewhere better than in fighting us.”

Cooke has memberships in the International Trademark Association and the Black Women Lawyers of Los Angeles.

“In my Goldilocks phase, chasing all those porridges, some weren’t too tasty, and I worried that I wasn’t going to be passionate about what I do,” Cooke said of her early experiences with assorted practice areas.

“But IP is on the edge of the development of new ideas, a gateway to the global marketplace,” she added. “And that’s for me.”

— John Roemer