Laura Orlando
Laura is the founding and Managing Partner of the Milan office and leads the firm's EMEA Life Sciences practice.
Laura is a recognised thought leader and litigator in intellectual property law, with a particular focus in the Life Sciences sector, where her expertise in all three areas of patents, SPCs and regulatory law enables her to advise comprehensively on enforcement and defence strategies.
She has rights of audience in all civil proceedings in Italy and she is a Unified Patent Court representative.
She excels in handling high-profile, multi-jurisdictional patent cases and has been involved in a number of European pharmaceutical cases referred to the CJEU. She also advises major pharmaceutical companies on regulatory law across the entire product life-cycle.
Throughout her 25 years' career, Laura has received numerous accolades and is consistently ranked in the top tier of prestigious legal directories, is regularly listed among the top 50 lawyers in Italy and as one of the 50 most inspiring female legal professionals in Italy.
She is a member of the IP Committee of the Milan Bar Association and served for ten years as Executive Secretary of the Life Sciences Committee of the American Chamber of Commerce in Italy.
Laura also is a dedicated mentor and legal angel to numerous innovative start-ups, and a passionate advocate for diversity and inclusion. Her involvement with 'The Charge of the 101'ers', a non-profit initiative supporting female-led startups, underscores her commitment to fostering leadership and growth among women in business and law.
Accolades
- "Lawyer of the Year – IP" at the Legalcommunity IP & TMT Awards 2025
- "Lawyer of the Year” at the Legalcommunity IP & TMT Awards in 2024 and 2023
- Ranked amongst Italy's 50 Top Lawyers of the Year 2018-2025 by Legalcommunity
- Recognised as one of Italy's 50 most inspiring female professionals at the Inspiralaw Awards (2022, 2023, 2024, 2025) by Legalcommunity
- Winner of the International Client Choice Award for Life Sciences (2022-2023) and Intellectual Property: Patents (2018, 2021)
- "Lawyer of the Year - Thought Leadership" and "Lawyer of the Year - Life Sciences" in 2022, "Life Sciences Lawyer of the Year" 2018 and 2020, "IP Lawyer of the Year“ 2019 at the Legalcommunity IP Awards
- "Life Sciences Lawyer of the Year (Pharmaceuticals)" 2021, "Life Sciences Lawyer of the Year (Biomedical)" 2018 and 2020, "Food Lawyer of the Year" 2019 at the TopLegal Industry Awards
- Recognised as one of the 300 World's Leading IP Strategists by IAM Strategy 300 (2019 - 2023)
- Ranked in Chambers & Partners in Life Sciences (Band 1) and Intellectual Property (Band 2)
- Ranked in Legal500 for Intellectual Property (Hall of Fame) and Healthcare & Life Sciences (Leading Individual)
- Recognised as Patent Star by Managing Intellectual Property
- Ranked in IAM Patent 1000, WTR 1000, Who's Who Legal
"Laura Orlando is an absolute superstar and expert. She has great experience in litigation, she is creative and brilliant." (Chambers Europe Life Sciences, 2025)
"Laura Orlando is no doubt the best IP lawyer of her generation. Her combination of litigation experience, creativity and cleverness is terrific" (Legal 500 Intellectual Property, 2025)
"Laura is brilliant and has a clever way of looking at things – it’s never solely legal advice; she offers a wise, interdisciplinary approach." Co-leading the life sciences sector in EMEA, Laura Orlando is "an absolute superstar." (Legal 500 EMEA, 2023)
“Business-like, pragmatic, yet sophisticated, the way in which she masters the case and deals with everyone involved is admirable, be it the judge or the other side’s counsel.” “Creative strategies, key advice and terrific support – Laura is one of the best lawyers you could have by your side.” (IAM Patent 1000, 2023)
Experience & capabilities
Selected matters
- assisting Gilead on the Europe-wide dispute concerning the SPC for the HIV drug Truvada including the implementation of the CJEU decision on combination SPC
- assisting Eli Lilly on a number of patent and regulatory matters, including most recently advising on a major patent dispute concerning a leading anti-psoriasis product.
- assisting leading Italian vaccine-developer AchilleS Vaccines on IP and regulatory aspects relating to a new platform for streamlining the research and development of new vaccines and a research project for the development of human monoclonal antibodies against COVID-19
- assisting Millennium (Takeda) and Janssen (Johnson&Johnson) in patent validity and infringement lawsuits at the Court of Milan in relation to formulation patents
- assisting JC Bamford Excavators Limited on a multi-jurisdictional patent validity and infringement case concerning telescopic handlers
- advising Lundbeck on a variety of patent and regulatory law matters in relation to medicinal products for the central nervous system
Services
Background
Laura graduated with honours from the University of Pavia and the Rijksuniversiteit Groningen and holds a Ph.D./doctorate in Civil Procedure Law from the University of Bologna.
She is admitted to the Italian Supreme Court (Corte di Cassazione).
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