Two new affiliated firms, PCT Capital, LLC, and PCT Law Group, PLLC, opened this week in McLean, headed by two former George Washington University Law School classmates.
Raymond Millien, CEO of PCT Capital, intends to “bridge the IP [intellectual property] and financial worlds” with his advisory and asset management firm. He hopes that the PCT Law Group, which has as one of its core areas is IP law, will “dovetail very nicely.” PCT Law Group is headed by managing partner Scott Johnson.
There are law firms that help companies obtain IP rights, and then financial companies that handle financial deals such as mergers, Millien said. “We look to finance companies based on IP and help them monetize IP or directly invest” in them, he added.
Washington won out over New York as the firm’s headquarters location.
“The D.C. area is the center of the IP world … there is tremendous opportunity in this space,” and New York, the financial capital, is only a train ride away, said Millien.
Millien practiced law at DLA Piper US, LLP and Sterne, Kessler, Goldstein & Fox PLLC in Washington, and then moved to the American Express Company in New York, where he was vice president and IP counsel. Most recently he worked at Chicago-based IP services provider Ocean Tomo LLC as general counsel.
Millien and Johnson met in 1994 during their first year of law school. Millien was interested in establishing his own firm with an IP and asset management focus, and Johnson wanted to open a law firm. They had discussed their aspirations recently, and started taking concrete steps towards creating the affiliates in late spring of this year, said Millien.
