Inhouse

Axiom’s rebranded managed legal services spin off Factor is evaluating around 100 third party tools to assess what its core tech stack will be going forward in what appears to be a move away from building its own in-house solutions.

There are new senior appointments at PWC, iManage, Mondaq, Litera, Wilson Allen, and Evisort.

Balfour Beatty has engaged Reveal as its preferred provider of eDiscovery services in the United States, in a massive win for the 2008-founded eDiscovery software and services vendor.

Holland & Knight has confirmed that it is to select ZERØ after a lengthy pilot, which CIO Matt McKinley tells us unexpectedly revealed that the email management and time capture tool is likely to generate increased revenue or at the very least be cost-neutral.

Baretz+Brunelle announced today (22 January) the creation of a NewLaw practice to be led by well known industry executives Brad Blickstein and Beatrice Seravello, who have joined the firm as partners. This new practice group will advise law firms and others in the legal ecosystem on “ways to thrive in the modern marketplace.”

Data integration platform Foundation Software Group says that one third of the Am Law 100 have now selected Foundation as their strategic solution for experience management, expertise location, and client development. This is an increase of 8% since September 2019, when we revealed that Hogan Lovells had selected Foundation, and a sharp increase in its growth trajectory.

So another CLOC London conference is over and one of the most interesting developments is the launch of a vendor directory. But law firm integration is slow. We share our thoughts on the conference content and welcome yours.

Axiom’s managed legal services spin off Factor – formerly Axiom Managed Solutions (AMS) – has hired Varun Mehta as CEO as it positions itself for significant growth.

The ‘Yoda’ of legal tech is officially launching his Idea Propulsion Laboratory to help law firms innovate.

Instead of looking at reducing rates law firms and legal departments are missing a bigger opportunity to save money – by embracing a collaborative mindset that prioritises eliminating inefficiency and waste across their interactions, says Apperio’s CTO Stephen Wilcock.

UK consulting firm Anexsys, which specialises in legal support and e-discovery, has entered a new partnership with leading global data analytics and eDiscovery provider Brainspace, which will see Brainspace offered as part of Anexsys’ eDiscovery managed services solution.

Legal technology associations across the globe are collaborating to conduct a worldwide research project to assess the state of the global Legal Tech industry, although the research is confined to the startup world.

Elevate has made a number of senior hires lately but the one to watch has to be Brian Kuhn, who founded IBM Watson’s legal consulting practice and was brought in by Elevate on 9 January to lead its new digital strategy and solutions business unit. We speak to him about his plans.

“The availability of AI technology and the pressure on corporate legal departments to become more efficient is encouraging the adoption of data-driven decision making. By that I mean, using data from prior transactions or matters to inform strategic and tactical decisions about future matters,” says SYKE’s founder and CEO Alistair Maiden.

Investments in the UK tech sector outpaced the US and China and rose dramatically to £10.1bn ($13.2 billion) in 2019 – a £3.1bn increase on 2018’s already very strong figures and the highest level in UK history.

Axiom spin off Axiom Managed Solutions (AMS) today (15 January) announces a wholesale rebrand under the new name Factor as the company differentiates itself from the Axiom brand and distances itself from other ALSPs that focus on commoditised ‘low end’ legal services.

Ascertus says it achieved significant all-round business growth in 2019, with a key driver of the business upsurge being a move by customers to the iManage Cloud.

Atrium’s co-founder and CEO Justin Kan has confirmed that the legal services sector disruptor is restructuring the company and backpedaling on its original ambition to provide broad legal services alongside its software for startups business, with the majority of in-house attorneys let go and given “the option to become preferred advisers in our professional services network.”

It created shockwaves across the legal industry at its launch in 2017 and has promised to revolutionise legal services, raising over $75m in investment over four rounds, but Atrium is now undergoing internal restructuring according to sources close to the company, who suggest that a large part of the legal workforce have been let go.

The UK’s largest provider of conveyancing legal services, Simplify, has selected LexisNexis Visualfiles as its group-wide software platform for case and legal process management.

SYKE’s growth continues as they hunt for new legal engineers in Paris.

Allen & Overy’s tech innovation space Fuse is now open to companies wishing to apply for a space in its fourth cohort, as it launches a pilot with current Fuse member Define within the high yield bond team.

Juro is set to launch in the United States following the 2016-founded contract management platform’s $5m Series A round led by New York-based VC Union Square Ventures.