Rita Rodin Johnston

Formerly a member of the ICANN Board

Rita Rodin Johnston is a partner at Skadden's Intellectual Property and Technology and Internet and E-Commerce practices.

ICANN

Johnston helped ICANN on matters relating to Internet policy by working on policy initiatives and representing clients. She represented two of the first seven new top-level domain registry operators (Afilias, Ltd. and Global Name Registry). For the former, she also assisted in the preparation of its successful bid to operate .info. Related to policy, Johnston helped draft ICANN's Uniform Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy (UDRP) and its implementation.

Career History

Johnston is a partner at Skadden's Intellectual Property and Technology and Internet and E-Commerce practices, where she helps clients negotiate and structure domestic and international transactions. Her focus is on technology and trademarks. According to ICANN, "She regularly negotiates outsourcing agreements, strategic alliances, joint ventures, development and distribution agreements, trademark and technology licensing agreements, and marketing and co-branding agreements. She also advises companies on Internet and e-commerce business and compliance issues, open source issues, privacy matters and branding issues. Her experience also includes regularly addressing intellectual property and technology and operational issues that arise in connection with mergers and acquisitions, project finance matters and initial public offerings." Clients have included Capgemini North America, CIT Group Inc., Companie Financière Richemont SA, Deloitte & Touche USA LLP, IBM, International Paper Company, Madison Avenue Diamonds, Merck KGaA, Skype Technologies, and the Women's Funding Network.

She was included in Chambers USA: America's Leading Lawyers for Business (2005 through 2007) and Chambers Global: The World's Leading Lawyers for Business (2006, 2007).

Uniform Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy