Chris Renk focuses his practice on litigating patent, trademark, copyright, trade secret, false advertising and unfair competition cases. Chris utilizes a value added approach in his litigation practice and believes that litigation goals should always be defined by each client's business objectives. He is skilled in developing and implementing litigation strategies to fulfill those objectives. Since joining the firm in 1988, Chris has successfully represented both plaintiffs and defendants as lead and co-counsel in jury trials, bench trials, and appeals. His cases have involved diverse subjects such as computer software, product designs, electrical controls, internet content delivery, medical and surgical devices, heat transfer, distilled spirits, contact lenses, fuel injection systems, athletic footwear and textiles processing.
Chris was selected for inclusion in the 2010, 2011 and 2012 editions of The Best Lawyers in America (click link to view). Best Lawyers is considered the oldest and most respected national peer-review publication in the legal profession, and is based on an annual peer-review survey. In each year from 2005-2012, Chris was included in Illinois Super Lawyers, and was also selected to their Top 100 list featured in Chicago magazine in 2005, 2009, 2010 and 2011. The Super Lawyers list represents the top 5% of Illinois lawyers, as chosen through a peer balloting process involving 47,000 lawyers from across Illinois, and through a research and review panel organized by Law & Politics magazine. Law & Politics asked the attorneys to name the best lawyers they personally observed in action. The Top 100 list represents the lawyers who received the highest point total in the balloting process. Since 2004, Chris has yearly been named to the Leading Lawyers Network and in 2010 was profiled in Leading Lawyers magazine (click link to view). Based upon peer nominations and approval by the network's Advisory Board, only the top lawyers are nominated and eligible for membership in the Leading Lawyers Network.
In addition to his active practice, Chris serves as an Adjunct Professor of Law at the Georgetown University Law Center and Northwestern University Law School where he teaches Patent Trial Practice and Patent Litigation II. He is a contributing author of the Patent Litigation Strategies Handbook, BNA, 2000, Patent Litigation, PLI, 2001, and Patent Trial Advocacy Casebook, Second Edition, ABA, 2010. Chris is a frequent speaker on various intellectual property issues, is the author of several articles on intellectual property law, and has been a featured guest on WB's First Business (click link to view), discussing intellectual property piracy in China.
Chris earned his engineering degree from Iowa State University in 1983. Prior to attending law school, he was an engineer at General Dynamics Corporation. He is a 1988 graduate of the University of Minnesota Law School, where he was a member of the Moot Court Board.
Chris is a registered patent attorney and is admitted to practice in Illinois, Minnesota, and the District of Columbia. He also is admitted to practice before the United States Supreme Court, the Court of the Appeals for the Federal Circuit and numerous federal district courts.
Mr. Renk practices in the Chicago office of Banner & Witcoff, Ltd.
