The Game-Changer: How Legal Technology is Transforming the Legal Sector — from todaysconveyancer.co.uk by Perfect Portal

Rob Lawson, Strategic Sales Manager at Perfect Portal discussed why he thinks legal technology is so important:

“I spent almost 20 years in private practice and was often frustrated at the antiquated technology and processes that were deployed. It is one of the reasons that I love working in legal tech to provide solutions and streamline processes in the modern law firm. One of the major grumbles for practitioners is the amount of admin that they must do to fulfil the needs of their clients. Technology can automate routine tasks, streamline processes, and help manage large volumes of data more effectively. This then allows legal professionals to focus on more strategic aspects of their work. Ultimately this will increase efficiency and productivity.”

Some gen AI vendors say they’ll defend customers from IP lawsuits. Others, not so much. — from techcrunch.com by Kyle Wiggers

A person using generative AI — models that generate text, images, music and more given a prompt — could infringe on someone else’s copyright through no fault of their own. But who’s on the hook for the legal fees and damages if — or rather, when — that happens?

It depends.

In the fast-changing landscape of generative AI, companies monetizing the tech — from startups to big tech companies like Google, Amazon and Microsoft — are approaching IP risks from very different angles.

Clio Goes All Out with Major Product Announcements, Including A Personal Injury Add-On, E-Filing, and (Of Course) Generative AI — from lawnext.com by Bob Ambrogi

At its annual Clio Cloud Conference in Nashville today, the law practice management company Clio introduced an array of major new products and product updates, calling the series of announcements its most expansive product update ever in its 15-year history.

AI will invert the biglaw pyramid — from alexofftherecord.com by Cece Xie

These tasks that GPT can now handle are, coincidentally, common tasks for junior associates. From company and transaction summaries to legal research and drafting memos, analyzing and drafting have long been the purview of bright-eyed, bushy-tailed new law grads.

If we follow the capitalistic impulse of biglaw firms to its logical conclusion, this means that junior associates may soon face obsolescence. Why spend an hour figuring out how to explain an assignment to a first-year associate when you can just ask CoCounsel in five minutes? And the initial output will likely be better than a first-year’s initial work product, too.

Given the immense cost-savings that legal GPT products can confer, I suspect the rise of AI in legal tech will coincide with smaller junior associate classes. Gone are the days of 50+ junior lawyers all working on the same document review or due diligence. Instead, a fraction of those junior lawyers will be hired to oversee and QC the AI’s outputs. Junior associates will edit more than they do currently and manage more than they do right now. Juniors will effectively be more like midlevels from the get-go.

Beyond Law Firms: How Legal Tech’s Real Frontier Lies With SMBs (small and medium-sized businesses) — from forbes.com by Charles Brecque

Data and artificial intelligence are transforming the legal technology space—there’s no doubt about it. A recent Thomson Reuters Institute survey of lawyers showed that a large majority (82%) of respondents believe ChatGPT and generative AI can be readily applied to legal work.

While it’s tempting to think of legal tech as a playground exclusive to law firms, as technology enables employees without legal training to use and create legal frameworks and documentation, I’d like to challenge that narrative. Being the founder of a company that uses AI to manage contracts, the way I see it is the real magic happens when legal tech tools meet the day-to-day challenges of small and medium-sized businesses (known as “SMBs”).