What’s Her Story with Julie Lenzer

Linda is a Director in the Litigation Department. She co-chairs the firm’s Education Law Group and is chair emeritus of the Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Committee.  The primary focus of her current practice is on understanding and serving the legal and risk management needs of independent day and boarding schools in New Hampshire and throughout the country. She has 40 years of experience litigating cases in state and federal agencies and courts, and in representing the interests of management and independent schools in all aspects of employment and independent school law. Linda served as Chair of the firm’s Employment Law and Education Law Groups for over 15 years, 4 years on the firm’s Management Committee, and was a former Co-Chair of the firm’s Litigation Department.

Linda has been the recipient of many awards during her career. She was the first women officer of the New Hampshire Bar Association when she became its treasurer in 1988. She was selected as an Outstanding Businesswoman of New Hampshire by N.H. Business Review, was awarded the Philip Holman Gender Equality Award, and was a recipient of the Jon Meyer Civil Rights Award and the Marilla Ricker woman lawyer of the year award. For twelve years, Linda served as a trustee and secretary of Rivier University in Nashua, New Hampshire. She served for several years on the board of the Center for Ethics in Business and Governance at St. Anselm’s College and was involved in several women in leadership programs for the Center. She has served for over six years on the New Hampshire Women’s Foundation and was its chair in 2022 and 2023.  She served in the Big Brothers Big Sisters program for 10 years. She previously served as a Commissioner for the New Hampshire Commission on the Status of Women where she was chair of its Gender Equity in Education Task Force. In 2008, she was selected as her firm’s Client Service Employee of the Year, an honor she is especially proud of.  Linda was named “Lawyer of the Year” by Best Lawyers for Education 2018. In 2019 and 2021, she was selected by New Hampshire Business Review as part of the “New Hampshire 200” of The Granite State’s Most Influential Business Leaders.

Serial entrepreneur and ecosystem builder, Julie is charged with building the ecosystem and resources for startups with cell-, tissue-, and organ- based therapies as well as enabling technologies across the supply chain. Through the City of Manchester’s winning $44M EDA’s Build Back Better grant, she helped launch the BioFab Startup Lab among other ecosystem-building and workforce diversity initiatives.

Prior to joining ARMI, Julie served as Chief Innovation Officer at the University of Maryland where she was responsible for the technology transfer office, Small Business Development Center, and was Founding Director of the Quantum Startup Foundry. She helped launch the Innovation Extension University Center and was on the investment committees for the Maryland Momentum and Discovery funds.

In 2014, Julie was appointed Director of the Office of Innovation and Entrepreneurship (OIE) within the U.S. Department of Commerce. There, she drove programs and policies that support innovative economic development such as innovation-based entrepreneurship and regional innovation clusters. As a Senior Advisor to the Secretary, she led the National Advisory Council on Innovation and Entrepreneurship (NACIE) and was tapped to represent the U.S. as the innovation lead at the G20 in China.

She also served as Executive Director of the Maryland Center for Entrepreneurship, the co-chair of Startup Maryland and co-founder of the Path Forward Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship, a nonprofit helping women launch tech-based businesses.

Julie was recently appointed by the SBA Administrator Isabelle Guzman as the Vice Chair of the Invention, Innovation, and Entrepreneurship Advisory Committee and is founding board member of the Center for American Entrepreneurship.