Officials celebrate the opening of the Law, Technology and Entrepreneurship Clinic in the Downtown Windsor Business Accelerator on Tuesday. From left: UWindsor president Alan Wildeman, dean of law Camille Cameron, Accelerator director Arthur Barbut, clinic founder Myra Tawfik, and law professor Bruce Elman.
A new program that provides local start-up businesses and entrepreneurs with free legal services was formally launched by the UWindsor Faculty of Law on Tuesday at the Downtown Windsor Business Accelerator.
The Law, Technology and Entrepreneurship Clinic (LTEC) is the only initiative of its kind in Canada to provide upper-year law students with a clinical legal education experience while supporting entrepreneurship and innovation.
Professor Myra Tawfik, LTEC founder and academic director, explains that the goal is to “serve the legal needs of local start-ups and entrepreneurs while providing skills-based, hands-on learning opportunities for law students in intellectual property law and business law.”
LTEC operates out of locations across the University of Windsor campus—including the EPICentre at the Odette School of Business—and in the local community through its joint venture with the Downtown Windsor Business Accelerator at 720 Ouellette Avenue.
“The addition of the LTEC is hugely beneficial to the Accelerator,” says Arthur Barbut, the Accelerator’s director and business animator, “as it will allow emerging businesses to access advice in such areas as corporate law, shareholder agreements, trademark law, patent law and various commercial issues.”
Students and faculty members are excited about the program. Adjunct professor and LTEC clinic director Wissam Aoun will closely supervise the students and provide guidance and direction to ensure that clients’ legal needs are met. He says LTEC offers the most innovative clinical and experiential learning program in the country in matters pertaining to intellectual property and business law.
In his address to the crowd of academics, students and the local business community, University of Windsor president Alan Wildeman congratulated the Faculty of Law for its long-standing leadership in realizing yet another innovative success. Dr. Wildeman went on to warn that the concept will surely be picked up and adopted by other faculties of law once they hear about it.
To learn more about the LTEC and to read its curated blog on issues surrounding intellectual property and business law, visit http://www1.uwindsor.ca/law/ltec/.