Last week’s artificial intelligence (AI) summit at Bletchley Park perfectly highlighted just how rapidly the landscape around this technology is morphing. The headline from the conference was the first-ever international declaration on AI safety, aimed at heading off the risk of “catastrophic harm” caused by AI. The sub-text is that the world, never mind the […]
As Microsoft releases its latest artificial intelligence (AI) tool today, law firms are considering whether they should invest in the capability and add to their already eyewatering bills from the technology giant. From today (1 November 2023), law firms and other businesses of a certain size can choose to sign up to Microsoft Copilot – […]
Increased hype surrounding the intersection between AI and law in the last year is undeniable. In the recent roundtable co-hosted by Thomson Reuters and The Lawyer, the attendees embarked on navigating the practical application of AI to in-house teams. The roundtable began with a call to arms. Discovering AI’s practical use for in-house legal teams […]
Private equity house Inflexion is making a strategic investment into Allen & Overy’s legal risk management division, aosphere. After the deal, aosphere will become a stand-alone entity. A&O will retain a minority stake in the business, while Inflexion will invest alongside US-based Endicott Capital. It emerged in September that financial services firm Lazard had been […]
Clients could soon demand a share of the financial benefits brought about by generative artificial intelligence, with so-called ‘gainshare’ deals that include discounts in bills likely to become more prominent across the legal sector. Gainshare arrangements are best known in the technology industry where the software underpinning deals can improve markedly during the lifetime of […]
Generative AI and its likely impact on the legal market has been one of the themes of 2023 but as we close in on Q4, at least we can all take solace in the fact that substantive structural change is years away. Right? Well, maybe. This year’s UK 200 report, available now on the City […]
Tech-focused Bird & Bird has bolstered its client offering by creating a new role at the firm and hiring a legal tech expert from one of the Big Four to fill it. Hélder Santos joins his new firm from KPMG where he spent 18 months as the firm’s head of legal tech Solutions, having previously […]
Over 100 organisations have now cloned code shared online by Travers Smith that is intended to help businesses develop ChatGPT-style systems. When ChatGPT launched last November, Travers’ technology heads took a look at the product and decided – along with many other innovation professionals in law firms – that they were not comfortable with the […]
Macfarlanes this week pushed the button on its roll-out of generative AI tool HarveyAI, following the largest pilot ever carried out in the history of the firm. Around 15 per cent of Macfarlanes’ fee-earning population across every practice area and all levels of seniority spent time this June using the tool. The results were then […]
Firms are starting to pour investment into legal tech, but the same cannot be said for their clients
Lawyers at Taylor Wessing will be given virtual tokens to trade as part of a new incentive scheme that enables individuals to turn their points into monetary vouchers. The firm’s corporate, IP and financial services teams will participate in the trial phase of the scheme, which will last until the end of the 2023/24 financial […]
Following the launch of its mentoring product for aspiring Black lawyers, the Stephen James Partnership (SJP) has extended its technology solution to cater for qualified practitioners globally. Recruitment business SJP launched Black Lawyers Matter Mentoring in 2022, claiming victory at The Lawyer Awards this year for Best Technology Product. It is a digital programme that […]