Principal Corporate Counsel: Trade Secrets, Copyrights, and AI in IP

Job description

The application window is expected to close on: 09/02/2026 Job posting may be removed earlier if the position is filled or if a sufficient number of applications are received . Members of the Legal organization at select locations will generally be expected to follow a hybrid work model, which includes two days of in-office attendance each week, with limited exceptions. Meet the Team At Cisco, the Intellectual Property team sits at the crossroads of technology, business, and law, with insight into a breadth of innovation spanning networking, cybersecurity, artificial intelligence, cloud infrastructure, collaboration, and observability. We work together inside a legal organization that treats IP as a strategic business asset and are building the institutional frameworks that let Cisco's engineers translate invention into durable protection. You do not need to arrive already knowing Cisco's technology. We will teach you the business; we are hiring for the legal judgment. AI is changing the terms of that work, including what we can protect, through which legal instruments, and with what level of certainty. And it builds new categories of exposure — in copyright, in trade secrets, in vendor contracting, and in prosecution validity — that require a dedicated function to lead. This role is that function. Your Impact This is a role built around a genuine legal problem: the IP frameworks that governed technology companies for the past thirty years do not cleanly map onto how AI-era innovation works. Copyright matters more than it ever has, but the rules on AI-generated output are still being written. Moreover, trade secrets may become the dominant protection strategy for proprietary systems, but only if that program is built and maintained with rigor. If you have worked on any of these problems (in any industry) that experience is directly relevant here. In practice, you will: • Build out Cisco's trade secret program as a genuine enterprise function; not just a policy document. That means working with various parts of legal, the business, and IT to: identify the best methodology and systems to classify our proprietary assets that deserve trade secret protection; detail the reasonable protective measures required to establish and defend that protection; and craft the legal and technical governance that makes the program defensible in litigation. • Own and grow Cisco's copyright program in the AI era. Not only will you handle the traditional function, but you will also deal with emerging questions such as: what Cisco can own in AI-generated output (creative and technical), whether and how to structure human authorship records to improve protectability, and how to manage the downstream copyright liability posed by foundation model training data in Cisco's vendor stack. • Work with the AI legal team to audit and manage AI vendor IP exposure, including being the IP escalation point for AI-related agreements and establishing the IP contractual standards that Cisco requires before deploying AI tools at scale. • Serve as the IP team's legal intelligence function on AI: translating USPTO guidance, Copyright Office reports, Federal Circuit decisions, and legislative developments in the US and abroad into timely executive-ready advice. Minimum Qualifications: • JD and active bar membership: J.D. from an accredited law school with active bar membership in at least one U.S. jurisdiction; • 8+ years IP legal experience: Minimum of 8 years of intellectual property legal experience, including substantial, hands-on work in copyright and/or trade secret protection. That experience can come from any industry, from a law firm, or from government. • AI & IP proficiency: Working knowledge of copyright and/or trade secrets as applied to AI-generated works. • A note on fit: this description covers a lot of ground, and we do not expect any one person to arrive covering all of it. If you are strong in some of these areas and lighter in others, apply. We will pair you with the right people inside Legal and with outside counsel where you need a second opinion, and you will build the rest on the job. Big-tech experience is helpful but not required. Preferred Qualifications: • Experience building or running an internal program related to trade secrets and/or copyrights in a company of any size or industry. • Experience structuring or leading a trade secret litigation matter or pre-litigation investigation. • Track record of credible, concise executive communication on IP risk; ability to translate genuinely unsettled legal doctrine into business-relevant advice for executives and engineers without over-hedging or misrepresenting the state of the law, and with validated ability to defend a position under skeptical questioning. • Ability to work with the patent team to advise them on AI-specific patent-related strategies, including AI-assisted inventorship documentation and any inter-jurisdictional differences that affect how we run patent protection. Please note that patent experience is not a requirement. Our patent team owns prosecution and will be a close partner to you. Instead, we’re looking for someone with the desire and ability to learn inventorship and other emerging patent-related AI issues. • Prior experience advising on copyright licensing for software and/or AI-generated content at scale, including SaaS platform output, API-delivered content, or enterprise software products where the line between human-authored and AI-generated deliverables is blurred and legally material Why Cisco? At Cisco, we’re revolutionizing how data and infrastructure connect and protect organizations in the AI era – and beyond. We’ve been innovating fearlessly for 40 years to create solutions that power how humans and technology work together across the physical and digital worlds. These solutions provide customers with unparalleled security, visibility, and insights across the entire digital footprint. Fueled by the depth and breadth of