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Do not do patent pros unless you already have the background. A lot of firms are hiring patent agents for the pure prosecution roles anyhow, and a lot of them are PhD level.
If you like tech, maybe see if you can do something tech transactions where patent licensing is a big part.
Ex-Biglaw Patent Prosecutor here. Listen to Associate 1 and Associate 3.
Is patent prosecution really a step up for you in terms of salary/hours? It's a commodity practice. Few Biglaw firms even tolerate it at this point, and those that do use patent agents for the heavy lifting.
Although patent litigation has been on the outs for a few years, the recent collapse of IPR practice should swing the pendulum back in the other direction. I don't think it will be easy to get a patent litigation job with no STEM degree, but maybe start as a general litigator, hammer those litigation skills, and do everything you can to get on patent cases.
If you don't like litigation, tech transactions and licensing are way better options that patent prosecution at this point, at least if you want a Biglaw environment. I have my own boutique practice with a few associates and I'm a very happy man. I spent the past ten years with my children four nights a week (divorced) and making a comfortable living. I'm killing it compared to normies, but obviously nowhere near a Biglaw equity partner.
Don't agree on your patent lit views haha. From what I understand even on the "outs" patent lit is the most profitable practice group for big players like Quinn and there is so much high quality work to go around chambers ranked practices regularly have to turn it down for lack of capacity. There's enough that a lot of the top firms don't even care very much about business generation for partnership prospects in the group and focus on other areas.
Getting patent lit without a STEM background isn't harder than getting any other litigation though fyi. You get a major plus if you have an EECS degree but otherwise they don't care that much and a ton of firms are very comfortable hiring non STEM people (in some cases they handle tech stuff and in others they are relegated to non tech stuff like pretrial prep and discovery). The problem for OP is that it is still Biglaw litigation and while getting that is possible it is very hard. OP doesn't have much of a shot without a federal clerkship unless they are already doing Biglaw lit. Alternatively they can try to get a ton of trial experience and leverage that or start at a smaller shop and try to move up.
I have prosecuted patents in pharma space for a long time and have seen people of varying backgrounds break in. I don’t think that is for you. Your technical background is the primary reason you will get attention in pharma and biotech — phd is almost a must. Days when people can get into that space with BS in chemistry or biology are long gone. Even in engineering and computer science, most people come with ms or significant expertise in the space. You have to speak the language of the scientists in the space.
Whether it's worth it or not depends on your goals and why you considered this route in the first place. It's unclear to me why you would even want to consider this route with the information provided, much less whether it's the right route for you