John J. Davis, III

John Davis is a founder and Managing Member at Kearney, McWilliams & Davis, PLLC. He practices and oversees the firm’s intellectual property, residential and commercial property, commercial transactions, and litigation practice areas. For his clients, John focuses on business problems and solutions, including entity creation, financing, mergers & acquisitions, entity reorganizations, dispute resolution, and corporate best practices and business strategy. His experience includes providing assistance in the creation of companies and commercialization of technologies, including identifying and filing appropriate intellectual property protections in patents, trademarks, and copyrights, as well as the enforcement of such rights. He also serves as counsel, mentor, or advisor to various companies and clients at several startup, incubator, and accelerator programs in Texas, including TMCx, JLABs, Station Houston, and Houston Exponential.

Dr. Davis represents a broad range of clients from early start-up companies and serial entrepreneurs to private funds or investment groups, as well as publicly traded corporations. Accumulating expertise from his own personal and professional experiences in academia, corporate pharma, small business, and now multi-member partnerships, John's preferred clients typically share his common interests and goals of starting, developing, successfully managing, and expanding their own businesses.

John completed his Ph.D. in Virology and Gene Therapy at MD Anderson Cancer Center in 2006, subsequently working for a local Houston pharmaceutical company designing and engineering translational medicines and biotherapeutics for cancer and immune disorders. He received his J.D. from South Texas College of Law in 2012. Prior to working as an attorney, Dr. Davis was a translational research scientist in oncology, immunology, gene therapy, and genetic engineering. He is also a small business owner, managing and operating an online advertising implementation and optimization company, showing billions of ad impressions a year.

John Davis is licensed to practice law in Texas and in the United States District Court for the Southern, Eastern, Northern, and Western Districts of Texas, as well as the United States Tax Court and the United States Court of International Trade. He is based in the Houston, Texas, office for Kearney, McWilliams & Davis, PLLC.

Education

• J.D., South Texas College of Law Houston, 2012
• Ph.D., Virology, Gene Therapy, UT MD Anderson Cancer Center, UTHealth Houston Graduate School of Biomedical Science, 2006
• B.S., Biology, Baylor University, 2000

Representative Litigation & Transactions

• Comprehensive business general counsel and outside counsel experience, advising large, small, startup, and established businesses on business issues including operations, liability, initial entity structuring and restructuring, financing and fund raising, and intellectual property protection and licensing
• Initiate and obtain temporary and permanent injunctions related to intellectual property infringement, online business disparagement, and partnership disputes
• Trademark filing, office action responses, oppositions, and negotiations regarding consent agreements and licensing with the US Patent and Trademark Office and various foreign countries
• Mediation and settlement negotiations in business disputes between partners, businesses, landlord/tenant, and other commercial transactions