Harbor acquires Ascertus to expand content management business and grow UK presence 

Transatlantic legal services consultancy Harbor has announced the acquisition of Ascertus in a strategic move to strengthen its presence in the UK and expand its service offerings in the document and content management space. The acquisition also bolsters Harbor’s presence in the corporate legal market, where 50% of Ascertus’ customers are from.  

Ascertus, a key implementation partner for iManage, supports both corporate law departments and law firms, with its customer base split almost equally between those segments. 

Ascertus’ COO and CRO Damian Jeal will lead Harbor’s global content management and collaboration practice. Roy Russell, the well-known and longstanding founder and CEO of Ascertus, will act as an adviser during the integration process and is then expected to retire.  

Speaking to Legal IT Insider about the acquisition, Harbor’s CEO Matt Sunderman said: “Organisationally there are folks at Ascertus and Harbor whose histories go back 20-plus years. Roy had a brief tenure at Huron Consulting when I was there, when [Harbor’s chief growth officer] Kevin Clem was there when others were there. So we’re not foreign from working together and the teams are even delivering right now.” Ascertus and Harbor have just deliverer a project for a large corporate law department where it made sense for the client because of the geographical reach. 

Geography is important in this transaction and Sunderman said: “Our intention is to truly build a partnership with the largest law firms and corporate law departments on a global basis, and having meaningful and critical scale in North America, the UK and Asia PAC is really important to do that.” 

Our interview with Sunderland and Jeal will be out tomorrow (30 October) so make sure you sign up for our daily mailouts here.