Marylauren Ilagen
Key details
- Job title: Head of IP & Global Brand Protection
- Organisation:Olaplex
- Geography: US
- Practice Areas: Patents, Trademarks
- Type: Non-Contentious
- Level:Senior-level
Profile
Marylauren Ilagan is head of IP at US hair care brand Olaplex where she leads the company’s global intellectual property strategy and brand protection efforts. In this role, Ilagan oversees the development and enforcement of Olaplex’s IP portfolio including patents, trademarks, trade dress and copyrights. This involves managing portfolios containing thousands of IP assets across multiple jurisdictions and supporting the company’s innovation and product development activities through IP protection strategies. Ilagan also leads brand protection initiatives aimed at addressing counterfeiting, unauthorised distribution and imitation products. Here she works with external legal and investigative partners to enforce actions designed to remove counterfeit products from the marketplace. Her responsibilities include implementing operational processes and technology tools to support IP management, enforcement and legal workflow. Beyond IP management, Llagan serves as the company’s lead regulatory and advertising counsel, advising on marketing campaigns, social media and influencer activities.
Comments
“Working with Marylauren has been one of the most rewarding professional partnerships I’ve had. She brings a rare combination of strategic thinking, creativity, humanism, and business pragmatism that elevates everything she touches.
“One of her greatest strengths is her ability to define and communicate the scope of a matter from the outset. She clearly outlines the issues at hand, the objectives of her work and the broader commercial context. Her instructions are clear, concise, and thoughtfully framed with minimal back‑and‑forth, delivering results with a simple and manageable manner.
“She also is super organised—creating systems and workflow to maximise efficiency—and highly responsive. She has a keen sense of how legal issues fit within the broader goals of the business and she consistently anchors her decisions in the company’s strategic plan, commercial priorities, timelines and risk tolerance.
“What truly distinguishes her is the way she approaches collaboration. She treats outside counsel as genuine partners, not vendors. She is open, candid, and generous with context—which creates a foundation of trust that allows for honest dialogue and thoughtful strategic planning leading to the best results. She is committed to continuous improvement: she takes the time to debrief which enables thoughtful conversations and reinforces a strong relationship.
“Her approach to budgeting is equally commendable. She is transparent about constraints and is always mindful of achieving meaningful impact without unnecessary expense. She consistently finds ways to maximise value while staying within tight budgets—something many strive for but few execute as well as she does.
“Finally, she invests in her own professional development and actively participates in the broader IP community—whether through conferences, panels or industry groups. She is committed to excelling in her role and also strengthening in‑house and external counsel collaboration across the profession. She has a well-deserved stellar reputation in the industry as one of the best. She exemplifies the qualities the WIPR Awards aim to honour.”
