FRANKENSTEIN APP COMING TO THE UK VIA KLA
Document management specialist Kramer Lee & Associates (KLA) has been appointed the UK distributor for DataTech SoftwareÕs thinkDOCS "intelligent document assembly and automation" system. As first reported in the previous issue of the Insider, although a relatively new product on the market, thinkDOCS is already winning business from US law firms (DataTech began life in the legal world as the publishers of the Quick & Easy electronic forms range) and insurance companies.

The key feature that makes thinkDOCS stand out from the competition (and there are about 20 other document assembly systems available in the United States) is its use of a 'live data' update facility. This treats all information as fields of data in a database, so if one item of information is changed, it is also automatically updated both elsewhere within that document and in all sequential documents.

DataTech president Paul Endress says that as well as being more efficient than the traditional cut and paste approach to document assembly, it also avoids the risk of creating "a Frankenstein document" made up of "a mismatched patchwork" of clauses. The latter point is particularly pertinent in the USA where a couple of recent cases have been lost by parties seeking to rely on documents that were subsequently found to contain ambiguously assembled clauses.

TFB ACQUIRE CB LEGAL BUSINESS
Technology for Business has acquired the assets and business of CB Business Systems (Legal) Ltd. As reported in a previous issue of the Insider, CB systems has a client base of some 150 firms, including blue chip Edinburgh practice Henderson Boyd Jackson, running its Signet accounts software but in March this year it announced that liquidators had been called in to negotiate a rescue deal as the company was facing voluntary liquidation. TFB joins the list of English suppliers, including Axxia, AIM and Solicitec, operating in Scotland. CB Business will now trade under the TFB brand name.
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US CASE SYSTEM HEADING FOR UK
Legal systems distributor Syscorp (01707 824824) has signed a new deal that will see US software developer Synaptec's Lawbase 2000 case management system marketed and supported in the UK and Europe. The product, which has a SQL Server back-end and integrates with applications such as Outlook, PC Docs, HotDocs, Carpe Diem and many practice management systems, is being anglicised by Syscorp and will be sold under the CaseFlex brand name.
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OZ BLOW FOR KEYSTONE
Phillips Fox, which has 10 offices across Australia, New Zealand and Vietnam - and which was one of the original beta test sites for Keystone software - has just chosen the CMS Open product as its new practice management system. The order, said to be worth $3 million, was placed with Horwath Computer Systems (HCS), the Australasian distributor for CMS Open. This project includes converting the firm from its current Law3000, BHL and Keystone legacy systems. Phillips Fox will implement CMS on a single database in Sydney for all their offices to access.
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PUBLISHER BUYS SLICE OF VIRTUAL LAW FIRM
eLawForum.com, the US online auction site for legal services, has received an undisclosed amount of equity financing from Wolters Kluwer North America, the US arm of the international publishing group. The deal gives Kluwer a 25 percent stake in eLawForum, as well as a seat on the companyÕs board of directors.

eLawForum founder John B Henry said it was unlikely the company would now seek additional outside financing. The company will use the investment for "further expansion into US and European markets sectors". In the latter case its only real competitor is Anthony Armitage's FirstLAW.co.uk virtual law firm. As part of the deal eLawForum will also make its services available to the Wolters Kluwer group. eLawForum says it is also in discussions with other "strategic partners". US sources report that eLawForum had previously raised $4 million from individual investors, has a monthly burn rate of $200,000 and a post-money valuation of $22 million.
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LOVELLS ROLL OUT REDLINER
Lovells has completed a practice-wide roll out of the DeltaView document comparison system from Workshare Technology (0207 481 6101). The firm previously used the now largely obsolete CompareRite redlining software.

According to Lovells desktop applications manager Ashley Jones "one of the absolute key things about DeltaView" is that it is compatible with email and has no difficulty comparing the content of documents originated in different file formats. Jones also said he "loved the fact DeltaView does what is says on the tin" and did not have pretensions to do anything other than compare documents.

Although always modest about its activities, Lovells is building one of the most effective IT infrastructures of any major law firm. Lovells will run DeltaView as part of its standard PC desktop, which includes Microsoft Office, PC Docs and InterAction. As reported in the last issue, the firm has also begun a major digital dictation pilot study.
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NEW WORDPERFECT TO SHIP IN TWO WEEKS
Corel has announced that the latest version of its office software - WordPerfect Office Suite 2002 - will be available in the UK, Ireland and Benelux countries from Monday 14th May. The suite includes WordPerfect Version 10, which the company modestly describes as the best version of its wordprocessing application since 5.1. Prices range from £199 for an upgrade from earlier versions of Word or WordPerfect, through to £599 for a new copy of the Professional Edition, which also includes the Paradox database product and Dragon speech recognition software.
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NORWEL SUFFERS A DOUBLE WHAMMY
Norwel has suffered a double blow with the news that not only were two of its most prestigious sites - Berwin Leighton and Paisner & Co - merging but also that the new firm (called Berwin Leighton Paisner - it commenced operations yesterday, 1st May) had chosen Elite as the platform for its new practice management system.

To be fair to Norwel, it and other traditional legal systems suppliers are increasingly being hit by the new orthodoxy which suggests that if you are a commercial firm with serious international aspirations, there are only four "world class" PMS products that will fit the bill, namely Elite plus Keystone, CMS Open and ResSoft.

DLA, which last week announced it had purchased a 2500 user licence for Hummingbird's Fulcrum knowledge management system, has also just begun the process of looking for a replacement for its old Axxia Arista practice management system. It too is expected to eventually choose one of the big four products.
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BIG BLUE BUYS INFORMIX
IBM has just bought the database operations of Informix Software for $1 billion in cash. Informix, as a company, will now focus on other areas of its operations and change its name to Ascential Software. Although Informix was at one point the legal world's most widely used RDBMS, since Unix went out of favour the product has been losing market share to Microsoft's SQL Server for mid-range NT applications, while Oracle has become the database of choice for larger firms. A spokesman said IBM will continue to sell and support Informix "for years" but would eventually combine it with its own DB2 product.
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HELLO BLACKBERRY, BYE BYE LAPTOP!
With RIM's Blackberry portable email terminal now scheduled to hit the UK later this summer (see last issue for first report) it will be interesting to see if the device has the same impact on UK lawyers as it has had on their American counterparts. Along with becoming the gadget du-jour among lawyers, replacing the Palm Pilot as the must-have accessory, a recent study by Goldman Sachs found that the usage of laptop computers dropped by an average of 70 percent (in some instances as high as 100 percent) among lawyers and professionals once they were also equipped with a Blackberry.

In otherwords, it looks as if a lot of lawyers have been lugging laptops around almost exclusively to handle email. Goldman Sachs point out a widescale switch to the Blackberry could also have a positive impact on a firm's hardware, software, training and system support costs.
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LANDMARK WINS COPYRIGHT DISPUTE
The Landmark Information Group has accepted "a substantial sum in damages" to settle a High Court action it brought against Sitescope Ltd for the infringement of Landmark's copyright in its Home Envirosearch environmental search reports service.

Landmark launched Envirosearch two years ago - the service provides solicitors acting for home buyers with data on contaminated land and environment risk factors - however last year Sitescope launched its rival Homecheck Pro service which contained features Landmark claimed had been copied from Envirosearch. After Landmark commenced proceedings, Sitescope admitted infringement and the case was settled out of court on payment of an undisclosed sum in damages. Sitescope has also given an undertaking not to infringe again and agreed to changes in the design and content of its Homecheck Pro report.

In a statement Landmark said "We felt we had to bring this case to protect our clients, who were understandably confused at the launch of a product that was so obviously modelled on our own... This action was not about stifling competition. We think there is plenty of room in the marketplace for competing products but it is important that all the players stand or fall on their own merits".

At the time of going to press it was unclear whether Sitescope would still go ahead with a major marketing campaign for Homecheck on the LawZone internet portal.
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L&H FOUNDERS THROWN IN JAIL AS SCANDAL GROWS
Lernout & Hauspie co-founders Jo Lernout and Pol Hauspie spent last weekend in custody after they were detained at an Ypres prison for questionning by Belgian state prosecutors. Both men were subsequently charged with stock manipulation and falsifying the accounts of the troubled speech recognition company.

In a related development, last week also saw L&H file a criminal complaint in South Korea against the former president of its Korean subsidiary, accusing him of fraud. The move came after an auditor's report revealed that 70 percent of the $160 million sales reported by the Korean subsidiary between September 1999 and June 2000 were fictitious. The report alleges L&H Korea used fake customer invoices to inflate its reported income, pay bonuses and drive up its stock price.

Meanwhile, on the civil proceedings front, Lernout & Hauspie returns to court in Belgium on 5th June, when it will face claims totalling Euro 563 million from 335 approved creditors. The proceedings will give the creditors an opportunity to vote on whether to extend a court order shielding the company from its creditors under the Belgian equivalent of a Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.
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LAW SOCIETY SUPPLIER HIT BY £30 MILLION CLAIM
The IT services company ITNet, which is probably best known in the legal market for running the English Law Society's IT operations as part of a three year outsourcing contract, is being threatened with a £30 million claim for compensation by the London Borough of Hackney. The claim comes after the 10 year outsourcing contract was terminated by the council after just four years amid allegations that ITNet's alleged "failings" had resulted in council taxes being left uncollected and the build-up of a backlog of over 40,000 housing benefits applications.

ITNet, which began its FM contract with the Law Society in February 1999, says it believes Hackney's allegations cannot be substantiated and is discussing a possible counterclaim with its lawyers, on the grounds that the contract was not lawfully terminated by Hackney.
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NEWS IN BRIEF

COURT NEWS IN BRIEF

Sir Henry Brooke already represents the judiciary on the Modernising the Civil Courts Programme Board, whose task is to modernise the civil courts, including the Family Division. He will now play the same role on the Crown Court Programme Board, as well as lead the judiciary on the new Judicial Technology Project Board. One of the tasks of this body is to develop a 10 year strategy on the way judges could use technology. It sounds a dry old announcement but in fact Sir Henry Brooke is one of the most computer literate judges on the bench today.
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CRM NOT A PRODUCT BUT A CONCEPT
In an exclusive interview Rick Klau, Interface Software's new vice president with responsibility for the legal sector, told the Insider the big challenge for law firms was not to think of CRM (client relationship management) software such as InterAction as just another tactical product. Instead it should be viewed as a strategic concept. "The key is not to see CRM in terms of saving a bit of money by creating better mailing lists. Used properly it can help earn extra fees by spotting relationships that generate revenue."

Klau, a former practising lawyer, joined Interface from iManage in January of this year. His main role will be to ensure the company's software continues to meet the specific needs of the legal market. On his most recent trip to London he was also in talks with a number of potential new business partners. (In the United States, Baker Robbins has become a strategic consulting partner.)

The company is launching IRIS (an XML web interface product positioned as middleware between the user's browser and database applications) in the UK on 1st June.
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DPS AND VIDESS LOOKING TO MAKE ACQUISITIONS
As uncertainty continues to cloud the future of some of the UK's leading legal IT suppliers, Osman Ismail, the managing director of DPS Software, has told the Insider that his company is in the market to buy out some of its competitors. "We are happy to purchase such brethren as see fit to sell, particularly those in the North," said Ismail.

We have also heard on the grapevine that Videss is on the acquisition trail. Although Videss tends to keep a low public profile, it is actually one of the most profitable suppliers in the domestic market, as well as one of the few with an apparently happy and contented user base.
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SUBS PRICE HIKE UPSETS SCL MEMBERS
Since the Society for Computers & Law, a registered charity, announced its recent 60 percent increase in subscription fees, the Insider has been contacted by a number of SCL members, including one current member of the SCL's governing council, expressing their dismay at the move. Their views can best be summed up in the words of one management consultant who told the Insider: "The sub rate has gone through the roof yet the SCL is running far fewer activities than in the past and started charging people £20 a time to attend them. In effect all you now get for £80 a year is six issues of a magazine that is heavy going at the best of times. I'm seriously considering whether it is worth renewing my membership."
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TRAPEZE SWINGS IN
TrapezePro, a new 'image enabling' product developed by Onstream Systems in New Zealand, is now available in the UK and Ireland through its recently appointed distributor Ascertus Limited (020 7360 6026). Ascertus was formed by Roy Russell and Steve Tomalin - both have been involved in the UK legal market since the days of Quintec.

TrapezePro is application and database neutral, so it can be integrated with most document, case, knowledge and practice management systems. It has been designed from the outset to run across the internet, intranets or any other TCP/IP network - the image viewer can operate as a Windows client or as an internet browser plugin and there is also a thin client Java version available. And, despite its newness, the Insider understands that the TrapezePro product is already incorporated within the Land Registry Direct service, where it is used to provide a rapid online delivery, view and print facility for title plans.
www.ascertus.com
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ONLINE NEWS IN BRIEF

Pricing is based on £10 per mailbox per month plus a one-off set up fee of £10 per mailbox. Each box has a 20Mb capacity. Extra space is available at a rate of £5 for each additional 20Mb block required. Special rates can be negotiated by firms wanting large numbers of mailboxes.
http://www.iomart.com

The service's CEO is Graham Ross, a well known personal injury lawyer in the North-West who has also had a long involvement with legal technology. He worked with Tony Landes on the development of Quill's first pre-DOS solicitors accounts software package and in 1979 he was the co-founder, along with Gerald Impey, of the original Prestel version of LAWTEL. This service was acquired by Centaur in 1994 and totally redeveloped as an internet product.
www.theclaimroom.com
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iMANAGE AND PERCEPTIVE TEAM UP FOR DEAL ROOMS
Document management specialist iManage and Perceptive Technology are teaming up to offer a new online dealroom solution for law firms. According to iManage UK manager Tom Bird the approach - which is based on iManage's new WorkSite interactive web site system and Perceptive's Mentor KMS - will provide "the benefits of a secure online environment, where you can easily share knowledge and collaborate on documents, that goes beyond the capabilities of a traditional dealroom." The new system will be available from 1st July.

iManage last week announced record revenues of $8.7 million for the first quarter ended March 31, 2001. This represents a 21 percent increase on the same period last year and a nine percent increase on its Q4 2000 figures.
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LAW GYM NOW OPEN
London solicitor Patricia Ogunfeibo, who last year opened her VATad.com online tax law service, this week launches her latest virtual law firm venture: the LawGym. LawGym Ltd (08707 307308) - strapline "is your business fit to compete"- is a Law Society regulated and fully indemnity insured legal practice that complements its inhouse skills with a panel of freelance solicitors, all of whom will be at least five years post qualification.

Although this sounds similar to John Yates' V-Lex virtual law firm, LawGym's spin on repackaging legal services is in its approach to pricing, with clients being offered a choice of fee rates for the same piece of advice depending upon the urgency of the work. For example, clients can choose if they want advice immediately by phone (£75 + VAT per 30 minutes), in writing within one hour (£85 + VAT), in writing within 12 hours (£65 + VAT) or face-to-face (£300 for a half day). There is even a 50 percent fee discount if agreed delivery times are not met.
www.lawgym.com
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ONLINE CASUALTIES MOUNT
The casualties are starting to mount in the UK legal marketing and referral "find a lawyer" web site sector, with three of the services launched at last year's Solicitors NEC event already either closed or moribund. Attempts to locate the Local-Legal.co.uk home page produced error messages. The LegalWeb2000 site consisted of one blank page, while the Law2U.co.uk URL directed visitors to a placeholder site containing no content.

Another of last year's launches - Law4Today.co.uk - is still in operation but the site has evolved into a general news site with legal links. For example, the Soap Zone section carries a link from a current story line in the TV series Emmerdale to legal advice on crime. However when we checked out the Find a Lawyer Zone, the categories (for different types of legal work) were empty. Some said they were still recruiting and others promised they would be up and running by Òthe end of the year 2000Ó.
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THE 40 PERCENT SOLUTION

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