Michelle Lee has resigned from her role as director of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office after a five-year career at the agency, Reuters reported Tuesday.
Former President Barack Obama nominated Lee for the USPTO leadership position in 2014 and the Senate confirmed her nomination in March 2015.
Lee previously held the roles of interim and deputy director at the agency.
She left USPTO two months after Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross and technology companies such as Cisco Systems and Facebook urged the Trump administration to retain Lee as USPTO chief for her efforts to establish standards for software patents and curb “patent trolls.”
Lee supported the establishment of a PTO regional office in San Jose, California, as part of the agency’s innovation campaign in the West Coast region.
She previously served as a general counsel and head of patent policy at Google before she joined USPTO.
