Michael Maier

Chevron Renewable Energy Group

With over 30 years of experience and covering a diverse range of practice areas Mike supports a number of REG functional areas including the CFO organization, Business Development, Sales and Marketing and Intellectual Property.   Mike joined REG after serving as Sr. Group Counsel and Sr. IP Counsel for Avery Dennison Corporation where he was responsible for all North American general legal matters as well as all intellectual property issues on a global basis for Avery Dennison’s Retail Branding, RFID and Printer Systems Divisions. Prior to that, he served as General Counsel for Ward/Kraft, Inc., Sr. IP Counsel for General Mills, Inc. and Asst. General Counsel for Moore North America, Inc. (now owned by RR Donnelly & Sons) after leaving private practice with an IP boutique firm. Mike has dealt with numerous transactional and licensing issues, standard setting organizations as well as regulatory bodies including the FCC and FDA through his work relating to frequency emitters, direct and indirect food packaging and medical devices. He has also worked with the Dept. of Agriculture and a number of House Committees on adoption of radio frequency identification technologies for use with plant and animal tracking. His practice areas include extensive litigation covering such areas as anti-trust, infringement, commercial issues, bankruptcy as well as labor and employment.  His experience with mergers and acquisitions has ranged from the purchase multi-billion dollar acquisition of the Pillsbury Company by General Mills to strategic downstream investments by REG.  Mike was also instrumental in leading several joint defense groups against non-practicing entities and negotiating favorable industry terms and other engagement and standstill agreements. Through his work with Intellectual Capital Management programs, he has proven that licensing can be significant and continuing source of revenue and providing funding to develop new programs and technologies while offsetting costs associated with administration of large portfolios. Mike lives in Iowa with his wife of 38 years and their three Bernese Mountain Dogs. He and his wife have four children, all of whom are “off the mom and dad payroll.”