MARKLAND HANLEY LLC

The Vision ? Lifting Humanity And Enriching Lives

Manufacturers of technologically advanced products, including artificial intelligence and other autonomous products, envision a safer, healthier, more prosperous, more productive, and more enjoyable future for all of us accomplished through the development and use of such products.
The Impending Attacks On The Vision

The new world of products liability involving advanced products, including artificial intelligence and other autonomous products, will include many of the elements of the old world - mass case filings, adverse media publicity, government inquiries, possible recalls, enormous legal fees and expenses, and potentially grave financial consequences for the company and its personnel.

But, this new world will focus on a different landscape of legal and technical issues and on new attacks by plaintiffs' trial lawyers.

Plaintiffs' trial lawyers are preparing to unleash unjustified attacks on the designers and manufacturers of technologically advanced products, including autonomous products such as driverless vehicles, pilotless aircraft, robots, other products that utilize artificial intelligence, nano-medical devices, and genetically modified products. The attacks will play out in courts nationwide, and they will be focused and relentless. Companies that design or manufacture such technologically advanced products, systems, or components, must begin preparing for these attacks now. Winning the battles ahead will hinge on the legal and technical responses, including design phase responses, of in-house counsel in partnership with outside product liability counsel, to potential attacks directed toward a handful of specific design and marketing decisions made by product designers and manufacturers.
In House Counsel Objectives

In-house product liability counsel are charged with the task of avoiding product liability case filings where possible through obtaining the best design phase and pre-suit advice available from outside product liability counsel and other team members, and, if necessary, with the task of directing the defense of filed product liability cases that have the potential to financially cripple their company. They must do so within a management set budget, and they must do so in a manner designed to stem the tide of further case filings. They are looking for outside legal counsel who can provide them and their company with a sense of calm and confidence in the new product liability world, amid a potential litigation storm ? outside legal counsel who will listen to and strive to fully understand in-house counsel's objectives and their company's overall goals and who possess the experience and skills necessary to provide sound legal advice and to help them achieve those goals.
CALM & CONFIDENCE IN THE NEW PRODUCT LIABILITY WORLD

Design Phase Consultation: When is a Product "Safe Enough" to Release for Sale?


Markland Hanley has the experience in the legal and technical areas of product liability and autonomous products to assist your company in assessing whether it has the necessary design phase process in place to effectively determine when its product is "safe enough" to release for sale. We can assess your company's in-place safety design processes from the defense-side product liability lawyers' point of view and advise the company as to any additional design phase processes that might be utilized to assist in reducing the risk of product liability suits being filed and to increase the probability of a successful defense if such cases are filed.
If Product Liability Cases are Filed, Markland Hanley Will Defend the Manufacturers' Vision of The Future in Court
HUMAN DRIVEN AND DRIVERLESS GROUND VEHICLES
PILOTLESS AIRCRAFT
ROBOTS
NANO ? MEDICAL DEVICES
ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE

GENETICALLY MODIFIED PRODUCTS
+ ADVANCED PHARMACEUTICALS

OTHER ADVANCED PRODUCTS
+ PRACTICE AREAS

YOU CREATE. WE DEFEND.
This Website Addresses:

The types of advanced products that are most likely to be unjustifiably attacked;
Markland Hanley's ability to provide manufacturers of technologically advanced products with high quality design phase and pre-marketing advice so as to minimize the risk of lawsuits being filed against such manufacturers; and
Markland Hanley's ability to defend such manufacturers should lawsuits be filed against them

The Technologically Advanced Products and The Manufacturers of Such Products that will Likely Be The Principal Targets of Plaintiffs' Trial Lawyers' Unjustified Attacks

We use the term "autonomous products" to describe all products that are designed to take actions in response to a set of conditions without direct human initiation. Such products can include products whose actions are initiated by algorithmic coding or other programmed decision-making frameworks, by self-initiated artificial intelligence such as GPU based deep learning processes, including processes relying on observation and replication of actions, rather than on human-coded decision instructions, by processes relying on replication or simulation of human physiologic neuronal and brain activity, or by self-initiated genetic coding.

Autonomous products that will likely be attacked include:

"Driverless vehicles," i.e. ground vehicles, including cars and trucks, operating with autonomous systems;
"Pilotless aircraft," i.e. air vehicles, including drones and commuter hovercraft, operating with autonomous systems;
"Robots," including cleaning and disinfecting robots, delivery robots, industrial robots, healthcare and elderly care robots, personal assistance robots, and other robotic products operating with autonomous systems;
"Nano-medical devices," i.e. certain miniaturized medical devices operating with autonomous systems;
"Artificial intelligence," i.e. true creative thinking, non-human entities, or hard artificial intelligence beings;
"Genetically modified products" and other genetically based products whose actions in response to given conditions are dictated by genetic coding.

Locations	No. of Attorneys
Dallas, TX	4

Practice Areas	No. of Attorneys
Corporate	1
Litigation - Mass Torts	3