Coinciding with the start of BigHand’s APAC user conference in Sydney later this week, we have news of a new product and a mew case study on productivity…
NEW PRODUCT LAUNCH
BigHand will this week unveil its new BigHand Office system in the APAC market. The BigHand Office platform is delivered by Esquire Innovations, part of the BigHand group. The technology solutions iCreate, iDocID, iScrub and iHyperstyles are used by a number of leading firms and also already being utilised locally firms such as HWL Ebsworth, Minter Ellison and Simpson Grierson (New Zealand), to provide leading automated document creation, style management, auto document identification and enterprise metadata management solution ensuring straight forward and efficient management across all organisations.
In the recent Technology Survey from the International Legal Technology Association (ILTA), in-depth analysis of the buying decisions of nearly 500 law firms is collated and analysed. BigHand and Esquire were ranked among the top providers once again this year with regard to questions about digital dictation providers, macro and template packages, automating paragraph numbering in Word documents and metadata removal.
Ian Kujawa, Managing Director of Esquire Innovations a BigHand organisation commented, “Our iCreate software is the number one provider named in the Macro and Template Provider category. This endorsement from our customers is the most valuable feedback we can get, and our team works hard every day to continue to earn their trust and confidence. With the combined resources of BigHand and Esquire, we are uniquely positioned to continue delivering the most robust and powerful productivity tools available. ”
“It is extremely exciting to be able to continually provide our clients in APAC the opportunity to utilise leading software from BigHand” Anthony Bleasdale, Director of BigHand commented. “Our team in Temecula has done an outstanding job of listening to the client needs and delivering innovative solutions to address those needs. Our client continually asks BigHand to provide development of software which is intuitive and provides firms instant benefits, BigHand Office will continue to provide that in APAC.”
“When our existing metadata remover came to end of life, we trialed a number of options available on the market. We chose iScrub as it worked straight out of the box, was by far the easiest to configure, and required no user training. Win, win.” Shane Robb, IT Manager, Simpson Grierson commenting about BigHand Office – iScrub
“The use of iHyperstyles has significantly enhanced our ability to repair style issues in a timely manner. Documents can start to cause problems due to a cocktail of different formatting and styles. iHyperstyles can quickly bring these documents back into alignment with our guidelines. The impact has been particularly noticeable for lawyers working on large complex documents out of normal business hours.” Garry Meikle, Director, Technology & Know How – Minter Ellison
NEW PRODUCTIVITY CASE STUDY
Leading edge digital dictation coupled with integrated speech recognition has allowed national law firm HWL Ebsworth to continue its rapid expansion while keeping costs under control and reining in risk. BigHand’s digital dictation has been widely deployed throughout the organisation, with a significant number of lawyers embracing the solution. In addition about half of all dictated files are being routed to BigHand’s speech recognition system for automatic transcription and file updates, boosting efficiency and keeping administrative costs in check.
According to National Information Technology Manager, Aaron Elliott, not only has this saved the firm money – he estimates that the approach has saved the firm hiring at least two more administrative personnel – it has improved client service levels thanks to a quick turnaround. The firm is one of Australia’s fastest growing law firms and BigHand’s digital dictation, integrated speech recognition and workflow software is one of the key productivity solutions for the firm.
Aaron explains that in the mid 2000s, the firm had been exploring digital dictation and building a business case to replace its old standalone analogue tape system. At the time, a discreet area of the firm was selected to act as a pilot, prior to the firm deciding on a much larger firm-wide deployment due to the robust and scalable nature of the solution whilst providing enough flexibility to cater for the specific requirements of each department, team and user.
A year ago HWL Ebsworth extended the system by deploying speech recognition, in order to fully “capitalise on the efficiencies of BigHand” says Aaron. Use of the technology is widespread – but not mandated. Nevertheless Aaron says that; “I wouldn’t mind betting that of the top ten fee earners in the firm, eight of them use it solidly”. He says that the efficiency dividends are significant for the firm, thanks to being able to turn around client documents much faster than was previously possible”. You can read the full case study HERE