Terrain of the Cracked Planet of Jeff Lindsay:
Continents, Islands, Rifts and Faults

Recent Activities: A Wild Couple of Years in China!

The past two and a half years in China have been one of the most surprising and enjoyable periods of my life. Perhaps the best years so far. At a professional level, I've had many opportunities to share and to learn from others at a variety of conferences and events. Asia is such an exciting place, and Shanghai feels like the epicenter. I can't get over how many fascinating people live here and come here. I get to meet some of them by just riding a train, going to church, or showing up at various events and meetings. Plus I've never had such an active and rewarding social life as we have here in Shanghai, all enhanced by the world's best food (especially when my wife cooks).

There's much more to report when I get a breath. Trips to New Zealand, Indonesia, Korea, Singapore, Hong Kong, and the U.S., plus many parts of China. Crazy! Some of it is documented in my photo galleries.

For so many years, I thought I was a small-town guy, totally happy in the quiet lifestyle I had in Appleton, Wisconsin. I often pitied those who live in big cities. Now I'm in the world's biggest city (by some definitions, anyway) and just love it. How do you people in smaller towns cope? How did I stand having to drive everywhere? How did I survive without veggie markets, fish mongers, bakers, banks, subway lines, and dozens of amazing restaurants within a 3-minute walk of my home? Ah, Shanghai! How I will miss you one day.

My work here in China has led to much broader networking and even far more speaking opportunities than I am used to, including many opportunities in China (some are listed on my resume page), along with opportunities in Singapore, Thailand, Australia, and even the United States. US events since coming to China have included being a plenary speaker at the Industrial Research Institute Annual Meeting in 2012, a speaker at the Managing IP forum about IP in China held in Chicago in May 2013, and a speaker at the AIChE Annual Meeting in Oct. 2011. Also had an interesting interview and video appearance for John Schmid's major story, "Paper Cuts" in the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel, leading to a discussion and sound byte from me on NPR's "All Things Considered."

Below is a photo from Asia Paper 2012 in Bangkok, Thailand, where I got to speak on innovation in the paper industry and take part in a panel on sustainability. The photo below is from the panel event.

Abbreviated Professional Bio

After nearly 20 years total in the Fox Valley of Wisconsin, I made a surprise career and location change by moving to China. I now live in Shanghai, China, working as Head of Intellectual Property for a growing Asian company, APP (Asia Pulp and Paper). I work in the heart of the world's biggest and most exciting city and love it. I'll be sharing more about my new life in China shortly--there's so much to tell and I've had so little time since moving here in the summer of 2011. Just like my previous jobs, it's my dream job, but the dream keeps getting more colorful. And now it's frequently in a different language.

Before moving to China, my previous dream job was as an innovation and IP consultant at Innovationedge, where I got to work with some of the world's largest companies as well as small startups, lone inventors, and everything in between. I especially loved working with bright, innovative people who were out to deliver breakthrough products and services to the world. Experiences ranged from helping world-class teams develop IP strategy for new products to helping new technologies get connected with partners for licensing and commercialization. I had four years of fun and adventure at Innovationedge and loved it. Great firm! Will always be grateful for the privilege I had of working there and learning from such good people.

Before that, I was Corporate Patent Strategist at Kimberly-Clark Corporation, a terrific consumer products company. I was at K-C for nearly 14 years in the research community there. My activities at K-C included:

• Developing and driving strategies to protect new technologies for tissue making and tissue products, absorbent products, RFID technologies, and many new product concepts.
• Founding a thriving community of practice called the Intellectual Property Chapter,
• Leading a couple of patent review committees.
• Leading efforts to pursue "business method patents" and build new strategic estates in areas related to marketing, RFID and data management, virtual reality, logistics, etc.
• Strengthening patents through design-around efforts, technology scouting, competitive intelligence and IP strategy. Efforts included successful development of enhanced estates with chemical patents, for example (patents for new chemistries such as fibers modified with cyclodextrin or chemical patents for polyvinylamine applications, wet wipe binders, etc.).
• Introducing and implementing an aggressive defensive publication effort as part of a low-cost intellectual asset strategy.
• Pursuing numerous patents (also assisted in drafting many of them) and drafting many publications.
• Helping groups around the company build their intellectual asset strategies and estates.
• Forging connections with external groups offering promising technology.
• Providing technical assistance in many areas to support new product development.

I'm a registered US Patent Agent with a Ph.D. in Chemical Engineering from Brigham Young University. After BYU I was an Assistant Professor and then Associate Professor at the Institute of Paper Science and Technology (originally the Institute of Paper Chemistry). I joined that private graduate school as a faculty member in 1987 when they were in Appleton, Wisconsin. After a tumultuous $43 million move, the whole Institute relocated to the Georgia Tech campus. I made the move (loved Atlanta!) and became an Associate Professor in 1992, was named IPST Teacher of the Year in 1993, and then joined Kimberly-Clark's R&D group in 1994, which brought me back to Appleton. Had 13 great years with that terrific company. When our Chief Innovation Officer and Senior Vice President, Cheryl Perkins, left to form a start-up company centered around innovation, I would soon recognize an opportunity too exciting to ignore. In August 2007 I joined Innovationedge as Director of Solution Development. Had several wonderful years there before China called.

Photography and Other Hobbies

I've got many collections of photos throughout this site, such as the recent "Memories of Winter" gallery (winter scenes from the Fox Valley, Wisconsin, 2008). They are copyright 2003-2008 Jeff Lindsay. Please don't use them without permission. Here are a few recent thumbnails, with links to various pages of photos: