Salaries for IP / Patent lawyers ?

[SpecialistAlf]

I've been trying to find info on entry-level and mid-career salaries for Intellectual Property and Patent lawyers in Canada, but I've had little luck finding actual stats. Can anybody here give some input ? My background is in Electrical Engineering, if it makes a difference.

[omigone]

Depends where you are. Salaries for IP lawyers aren't usually different than other lawyers, especially at the National (Large Firm) Level. For example, an IP lawyer at BLG, Norton Rose etc. makes the same as a construction lawyer at the same firm. 

Generally, smaller firm salaries are hard to find. You may see differences in billing rates and profits per equity partner, but that won't matter much until you're 7-10 years into your career. 

The salary grid is here: https://www.zsa.ca/salary-guide/ 

[SpecialistAlf]

52 minutes ago, omigone said:

Depends where you are. Salaries for IP lawyers aren't usually different than other lawyers, especially at the National (Large Firm) Level. For example, an IP lawyer at BLG, Norton Rose etc. makes the same as a construction lawyer at the same firm. 

Generally, smaller firm salaries are hard to find. You may see differences in billing rates and profits per equity partner, but that won't matter much until you're 7-10 years into your career. 

The salary grid is here: https://www.zsa.ca/salary-guide/ 

Yeah I read that, but to be honest those salaries seem a bit high to me. Either that, or the small firm salaries which are suspiciously unaccounted for are drastically lower than medium sized firms 

Edited June 1, 2023 by SpecialistAlf

[OnlyResident]

There are not that many small IP practices and the large boutiques pay the same as the big firms. Based on my limited exposure to it, I would hazard a guess that it starts out at 80-90k at the smaller firms for a first-year associate and then goes up 10-15k per year after that. 

[SpecialistAlf]

30 minutes ago, OnlyResident said:

There are not that many small IP practices and the large boutiques pay the same as the big firms. Based on my limited exposure to it, I would hazard a guess that it starts out at 80-90k at the smaller firms for a first-year associate and then goes up 10-15k per year after that. 

Are salaries in IP generally higher than in other areas of practice ?

[OnlyResident]

43 minutes ago, SpecialistAlf said:

Are salaries in IP generally higher than in other areas of practice ?

Salaries typically depend on the size of the firm and less on the area of practice. 

[SpecialistAlf]

14 hours ago, OnlyResident said:

Salaries typically depend on the size of the firm and less on the area of practice. 

I see, but aren't starting salaries in small firms generally closer to 40-70k for lawyers in general ?

Edited June 1, 2023 by SpecialistAlf

[GoBigOrGoHome]

On 6/1/2023 at 11:03 AM, SpecialistAlf said:

I see, but aren't starting salaries in small firms generally closer to 40-70k for lawyers in general ?

Generally speaking if you lump in family, crim, wills & estates, etc. - but there are some practice areas that do pay more (and even some small firms in the previously mentioned practice areas that will pay more). 

[SpecialistAlf]

On 6/25/2023 at 5:30 AM, GoBigOrGoHome said:

Generally speaking if you lump in family, crim, wills & estates, etc. - but there are some practice areas that do pay more (and even some small firms in the previously mentioned practice areas that will pay more). 

Is Patent Law one of those that pays more even in small firms ?

[GoBigOrGoHome]

8 minutes ago, SpecialistAlf said:

Is Patent Law one of those that pays more even in small firms ?

I strongly suggest you do some research to understand what a boutique is. Boutiques can be large and they can be small. 
 

Join Reddit and use the search function in the many legal subreddits. 

[SpecialistAlf]

1 hour ago, GoBigOrGoHome said:

I strongly suggest you do some research to understand what a boutique is. Boutiques can be large and they can be small. 
 

Join Reddit and use the search function in the many legal subreddits. 

I asked on r/patentlaw and r/LawCanada but received very few replies. That's why I joined this forum

[Rashabon]

It depends. A lot of patent law is done at larger firms as far as I know, but there are boutiques. CPST IP for example (https://cpstip.com/) was formed by a bunch of Bay street large firm IP lawyers. I imagine they pay well. You may want to post in the IP subforum since that might get someone that actually practices in the space to chime in.

[SkylerD]

I am using Salary Assessor from Economic Research Institute. Data as of 5/16/2023. I know this isn't the most polished photo, but I'm not allowed to use this for personal consumption. Regardless, I hope these figures help; they are the Ontario Average.

(Figures are in Canadian Dollars)

Edited July 14, 2023 by SkylerD