Executive Biographies > Director, Office of Enforcement

Robert L. Stoll

Robert L. Stoll became the director of the Office of Enforcement for the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) in 2002. He is responsible for USPTO domestic and international enforcement initiatives. This includes providing information about intellectual property protection to American businesses and monitoring, investigating, and evaluating foreign compliance with more than 200 recent trade agreements, including TRIPS, the trade-related agreement on intellectual property.

In 1995, Mr. Stoll became the Administrator of the Office of Legislative and International Affairs for USPTO. In this capacity, he led development and analysis of legislation concerning intellectual property, as well as analysis of international issues related to intellectual property.

Mr. Stoll was appointed Executive Assistant to the USPTO Director in 1994 and was responsible for providing technical and policy assistance to the Director on a broad range of national and international intellectual property issues. He also helped develop and plan USPTO strategic goals, objectives, and priorities, and served as a liaison with patent and trademark bar groups and academic and scientific communities.

Mr. Stoll joined the Federal Service in 1979 as a Chemical Engineering Researcher in metallurgy at the United States Bureau of Mines, where he worked until 1982. He joined the USPTO in 1982 as a Patent Examiner, reviewing patents for metal containing complexes and compounds. In 1990, he became a Supervisory Patent Examiner, managing the examination of classified chemical applications, radioactive bio-treating compositions, and liquid crystals.

Mr. Stoll holds a bachelor of science in chemical engineering from the University of Maryland. While working at USPTO, he earned a juris doctor from Catholic University and became a member of the Maryland Bar.

United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO)

Since 1790, the basic role of the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) has remained the same: to promote the progress of science and the useful arts by securing for limited times to inventors the exclusive right to their respective discoveries (Article 1, Section 8 of the United States Constitution). Today, the USPTO is a federal agency in the Department of Commerce, headquartered in Alexandria, Virginia. Through the issuance of patents, the USPTO encourages technological advancement by providing incentives to invent, invest in, and disclose new technology worldwide. Through the registration of trademarks, the agency assists businesses in protecting their investments, promoting goods and services, and safeguarding consumers against confusion and deception in the marketplace. By disseminating both patent and trademark information, the USPTO promotes an understanding of intellectual property protection and facilitates the development and sharing of new technologies worldwide.