Three legal tech companies have raised a total of $198m in new funding rounds unveiled over the past two weeks, with the contract automation sector in particular continuing to draw significant external investment.
UK-headquartered contract automation platform Juro has raised $23m in Series B funding, while digital contracting platform Ironclad yesterday (18 January) announced a $150m Series E at a $3.2bn valuation, and US legal research challenger Casetext filed notification with the SEC of a $25m Series C.
Juro’s latest raise saw it increase its market valuation by more than five times. Eight Roads, the global venture capital fund which previously invested in Alibaba, Cazoo and Appsflyer, led the round. Juro points out that it is now used in over 85 countries and by 6,000 companies including Deliveroo, Cazoo, Trustpilot and TheRealReal.
Existing investors Union Square Ventures, Point Nine Capital, Seedcamp and Taavet Hinrikus, co-founder of Wise, formerly known as TransferWise, also participated in the funding round. Eight Roads Partner, Alston Zecha, joins Juro’s board.
Juro is an all-in-one contract automation platform enabling legal counsel and their teams to manage contracts in a single web browser. It says that it will use the new investment to expand into the US and Europe, further develop the platform’s customer experience and power the company’s executive recruitment drive as it ramps up its go-to market strategy. Juro currently has offices in London and Riga and is hiring in all locations.
Alston Zecha of Eight Roads, and now a Director at Juro, added: “Until Juro, there hasn’t been an all-in-one platform which automates contracts and provides frictionless integrations with clients’ workflows. Juro is used by legal, sales, HR and other teams at some of Europe’s best high-growth companies including many in Eight Roads’ portfolio. It has market-leading customer satisfaction scores plus the highest employee satisfaction score we’ve seen at a scaleup. We are thrilled to partner with Richard, Pavel and the Juro team.”
The investment round takes Juro’s total funds raised to $31.5m.
Ironclad’s raise, meanwhile, brings its total funding to $333m. Franklin Templeton, a global investment management firm known for backing companies including OneTrust and Gong, is leading the round. The round also includes previous investors like BOND, YC Continuity, Emergence, Lux, Haystack, Accel, and Sequoia Capital. Ironclad says that it will use the funding to fuel product innovation and scale its digital contracting platform.
Founded in 2014, Ironclad is used by companies ranging from Fortune 500 companies such as L’Oréal and Mastercard, to ‘industry vanguards’ like Texas Rangers Baseball Club and Snap.
“We’ve been following the digital contracting space for years, and Ironclad is the clear leader,” said Ryan Biggs, managing director of Franklin Templeton’s Franklin Venture Partners. “Other players have some components of the solution, but only Ironclad has the whole package. They are leading the field when it comes to vision, product innovation, and team, and we’re excited to partner with them to build the dominant platform for all business-to-business contracting.”
Elsewhere, Casetext, which was co-founded by CEO Jake Heller and chief innovation officer Pablo Arredondo and markets itself as a more cost-effective replacement for Lexis and Westlaw, quietly raised $25m. The new raise, which has not yet been formally announced but has been filed with the SEC, was first flagged by LawSites. It was led by BuildGroup, and all other previous significant investors in the company participated, including Union Square Ventures, Canvas Ventures, Y Combinator, and Touchdown Ventures. Marks Baughan Securities LLC served as the exclusive financial advisor to Casetext.
Heller told LawSites editor Bob Ambrogi that the capital will help Casetext continue to create and improve products that help lawyers search the law and their own documents as well as to efficiently draft legal documents like briefs. “We will especially be making further investments into AI technologies,” Heller said.
caroline@legaltechnology.com