With Legal Tech New York (LTNY) kicking off tomorrow (2 February) there have already been a flurry of product launches and upgrades announced over the past few days as the latest wins and deals of 2016 also flood in.
Wins and deals
In the UK, top 100 law firm Capsticks has chosen Tikit’s Carpe Diem Next Generation for Time Recording for its 200-plus fee-earners.
At Capsticks, which specialises in health, social care and social housing, IT director Tim Bond said of Carpe Diem: “The intuitive interface makes it simple to use and the seamless display across devices means no matter how or where our fee earners are recording time, whether on their laptop, phone or tablet, in the office, on a train, they are always presented with the same interface and are able to access all the features and functionality of the software. Having that level of integration and mobility was a key determinant for us”.
Fellow top 100 law firm Russell Cook Solicitors, meanwhile, has selected Phoenix Business Solutions and the iManage Work suite.
Russell Cook embarked on a major IT project to review and upgrade all key components of its core IT applications. It was highlighted early on that a document and email management strategy was part of this process. Having a clear solution to support the firm’s 200 specialist lawyers was crucial to aid efficiency, collaboration and to meet the firm’s governance and compliance needs.
iManage was selected due to its presence and expertise in the legal field along with the security of a solid and innovative roadmap that met the vision and needs of the firm. The Phoenix iManage Work Administration Suite was selected as part of the contract to assist in full lifecycle management of matter workspaces for the firm.
And with Tech City UK having recently identified the 30 digital companies selected to join the first intake of its new Upscale programme, which supports some of Europe’s fastest growing startups, US law firm Cooley has announced that it is Upscale’s sole legal partner.
“We’re excited to partner with Tech City UK on its innovative Upscale programme,” said Justin Stock, managing partner of Cooley’s London office. “We bring to the table Cooley’s global Silicon Valley perspective and industry contacts that will support these companies in reaching their goals with a view to increasing permanently the flow of Upscale stage funding to the UK.”
In the US, technology consultancy MacroAgility has partnered with iManage to formally offer the iManage Document Management System suite to the law firms and financial institutions it advises.
“Legal firms, entrepreneurs, and organizational leaders have been searching for an efficient way to integrate iManage and Google apps. After listening to the needs and concerns of customers and business leaders, the document management experts at MacroAgility Systems developed Gmail Integration with iManage. Now anyone can automatically file emails directly from Gmail to iManage Work with the click of a button. You can also attach documents from WorkSite to Gmail,” MacroAgility told Legal IT Insider.
And activity within the eDiscovery sector (highlighted in the January issue of Legal IT Insider) continues apace, with the news that data risk management firm OmniVere has acquired electronic discovery and legal technology consulting firm Kiersted.
The acquisition is said to complement and extend OmniVere’s discovery and consulting businesses and enhances OmniVere’s geographic reach and client base.
Kiersted, which has offices in Houston, New York, Newport Beach and Atlanta, has been awarded kCura’s coveted Best in Service designation three years in a row, demonstrating an exceptional level of technical expertise, client service and knowledge of Relativity.
Staying within eDiscovery and QDiscovery has announced that it has become a Relativity premium hosting partner.
“We have always believed that fully integrated platforms are the most secure and efficient way to process, host and review. Whether our clients are working with Relativity 9.3 or Viewpoint, they have access to best-in-class technology that allows them to process and review faster, leverage advanced analytics, streamline workflows, and automate complex productions,” said David Barrett, CEO of QDiscovery.
Meanwhile, Xact Data Discovery, which recently acquired Orange Legal Technologies, has achieved recertification in kCura’s Orange-level Relativity best in service designation for outstanding and exceptional customer service for Relativity end-users.
There are two designations for best in service partners’ data centers: Orange and Blue. While both signify data centers that provide a quality Relativity experience, Orange-level sites have made additional investments in people, processes and technology to manage installations with above-average user counts – all while maintaining the high standards of best in service.
And Virginia-based Venio Systems has been selected by the Department of Justice Executive Office for United States Attorneys to use its all-in-one eDiscovery platform VenioOne, with the Department planning on deploying the new system in the cloud.
In Australia, Thomson Reuters Elite has announced a new partnership with GlobalX Legal Solutions, Australia’s leading provider of online information and conveyancing and legal support services.
GlobalX enables 3E, Enterprise, and MatterSphere clients to make property settlement bookings directly from each matter with minimal data entry, streamlining the conveyancing process for thousands of professionals.
Clients can perform quick and accurate searches from hundreds of national and international authorities and retrieve relevant documents and billing records within the GlobalX Online Search Platform in real-time, thereby eliminating unnecessary administration to optimise workflow.
“Because the online information services offered by GlobalX seamlessly integrate with Elite practice management solutions, they enable Elite clients to instantly and easily retrieve the documents and billing information they need to centralize critical information and recover searching costs,” said Elisabet Hardy, vice president of Product Management at Elite.
Product launches and upgrades
UK-based automated document bundling specialist Zylpha has added four new software integrations: to SharePoint, iManage, Civica and NetDocs.
Further integrations are also being planned for LEAP and an upgrade to the Iken case management connector.
The new additions complement Zylpha’s existing range of successful electronic document bundling connectors. These include: Visualfiles/Solcase from LexisNexis, SOS Connect, TR Envision, Axxia FED, and FileStream.
Zylpha’s head of development, Nigel Spicer said: “The increase in demand for our bundling systems, from both legal practices and local authority lawyers, has been quite dramatic.”
Australia-headquartered document workflow solutions company DocsCorp, last week announced plans to deliver a new, cloud-based capability that will be called DocsCorp Cloud. In addition, DocsCorp will publish new add-ins that will extend the functionality of cleanDocs and compareDocs within Office 365.
The new solutions will be hosted on public cloud platform Microsoft Azure. The DocsCorp Cloud-based versions of cleanDocs and compareDocs will not replace desktop editions of these products, but will provide clients with additional options and a greater degree of flexibility in accessing DocsCorp technologies from devices such as Surface Pro, iPad, Mac, and web browsers. DocsCorp will continue to develop and enhance its suite of Windows-based desktop products, including contentCrawler and pdfDocs in addition to cleanDocs and compareDocs. The company is also in discussions with key partners in the enterprise content management and document management system space about integrating their software with the DocsCorp Cloud.
Dean Sappey, DocsCorp President and co-founder said: “The Microsoft Azure environment presents clients with an entirely new and innovative way in which they can access our software to do their work – one that is not tied to the desktop, but rather can be accessed from any device, anytime, anywhere for greater flexibility.”
San Francisco-headquartered information retrieval and analytics provider Recommind has announced the launch of Axcelerate Cloud, the latest iteration of its subscription-based SaaS eDiscovery product built on the Axcelerate platform. Now incorporating efficiency scoring, Axcelerate Cloud builds on Axcelerate’s interactive business intelligence layer to provide legal teams powerful, simple insights into the efficiency levels they are achieving across their discovery project portfolios.
“Accenture has been leveraging Recommind’s technology and services to achieve great discovery results since 2009,” said Rick Schoeneck, director of electronic discovery at Accenture. “We were searching for a capability we could manage internally that would allow us to initiate document reviews quickly and analyse large amounts of data efficiently, but without traditional per/GB pricing. Axcelerate Cloud allows us to use Recommind’s managed platform and analytics tailored to our specific needs on a predictable subscription basis.”
Time, billing, accounting and project management software provider BQE Software has announced updates for BillQuick Legal 2016 to accelerate the efficiency, effectiveness and convenience of legal time tracking and billing.
The new features in BillQuick Legal 2016 enable attorneys and legal professionals to effortlessly organize matters and manage accounts payable. Key features of BillQuick Legal 2016 include a high degree of automation including the ability to automatically import transactions, auto-update matter information from the client screen.
“Simply put, BillQuick Legal 2016 allows you to do more in less time,” said Shafat Qazi, CEO and founder of BQE Software.
Case and matter management system provider LawBase has announced that the company is launching LawBase 12.5 at Legaltech New York on February 2-4.
LawBase 12.5 includes the following updates: new workflow editor; customized tool tips; improvements to LBConcierge automation tool; improvements to Exchange integration; enhanced HTML and rich text data types; and an improved product update distribution method.
“We look forward to showing attendees why thousands of users across the nation have chosen LawBase as their case and matter management solution,” said Phil Homburger, president of LawBase.
Also announcing a new launch at LTNY, litigation technology and case management provider TCDI is launching Fox, an affordable end-to-end discovery solution for the legal industry.
A beta version of the product was launched in late 2015, and now the full version is available to the industry. Geared to the mid-tier corporate and law firm market, Fox brings together data processing, complex databases, workflows and review strategies in one simplified SaaS product to streamline the review process. Fox ensures all cases are given access to the best available technology, including CAAT analytics, at predictable pricing so they can be properly litigated and defended on merit.
“We have worked as a litigation partner with our clients for the past 30 years, and we were seeing a need in the market for a solution that would help the mid-tier,” said Bill Johnson, CEO, founder, and president of TCDI.
LTNY will also see the launch and showcase by legal process outsourcing provider Inventus of Spotlight, a sophisticated business data analytics platform which provides clients with insights into their litigation portfolio, enabling comprehensive outsourcing visibility, predictability and cost management.
Inventus Spotlight is an advanced business analytics application. Aggregating data from various sources including Relativity, LAW and other third party applications, Spotlight gives clients real-time insight into their data and litigation portfolio.
Because data is presented in fully customizable charts and graphs, clients can now easily prepare law department budgets and executive level presentations. Spotlight is available on mobile devices and tablets providing clients with access into their data anytime and anywhere.
And Yerra Solutions, a global legal and IP services company providing consulting, managed services and technology solutions to global Fortune 500 clients, has announced that it will launch a new service offering called Yerra Clearly at LTNY.
Yerra Clearly combines process management, proprietary software and expert consulting to deliver superior management of a company’s legal spend and improved cost-control results. The hybrid approach provides in-house legal teams with a level of support and sophisticated analysis typically missing in purely technology-driven solutions and more traditional outsourcing operations.
Outside of the LTNY bubble, data provider Avention, creator of OneSource Solutions for smarter business insights, has announced the release of OneSource DataVision, a solution that increases the value of existing customer and prospect data and information by centralising, analysing and visualising multiple data sources – both internal and external – within a single view.
Aventions tools are used by over a third of the UK’s top 100 law firms, where marketing professionals can now perform better business analysis and efficient and accurate customer segmentation for targeted campaigns.
People moves
Innovative Computing Systems, Inc., a provider of information technology services to law firms nationwide, has announced the addition of Amy Kosey to the company’s solutions sales team. Amy will serve as an account executive, where she will work with clients and vendors to ensure the delivery of consistent and superior services to all clients.
Amy has worked in the legal vertical for almost 30 years. She has worked with vendors such as LexisNexis (Business of Law Solutions), Juris, CompuLaw, ASK Legal (her own independent legal technology consulting company) and with a consulting firm and law firm where she performed high-quality work as a Network Administrator.
Amy will be based out of Innovative Computing Systems’ San Francisco office, keeping Northern California law firms on the forefront of legal technology.
TRU Staffing Partners Inc., a search firm representing talent and opportunities in cybersecurity, investigations, e-discovery and data analytics, has announced the company’s TRU Cyber division successfully represented (Robert) Bob Anderson, former national security executive with the Federal Bureau of Investigation, in his recent move to Navigant Consulting, Inc. as managing director of the burgeoning cybersecurity practice.
Industry achievements
Quill has achieved ‘1 Star’ accreditation for 2016 by Best Companies, the organisation behind ‘The Sunday Times Best Companies to Work For’ lists.
Quill’s upgraded ranking is based on the results of Best Companies’ national annual survey of almost 410,000 employees from over 1,300 UK-based companies who were invited to rate their employers on attributes such as leadership, management, personal growth, wellbeing and community involvement. Of the ensuing 768 businesses who gained accreditation, Quill was awarded ‘1 Star’ status.
“This year’s Best Companies results are a step up from last year’s ‘One to Watch’ accreditation”, explains Julian Bryan, Quill’s Managing Director. “Our survey responses show higher engagement towards Quill than 12 months ago which is a strong statement by our staff that our management team’s efforts to improve our workplace is being successful.”
And finally, legal systems innovator Zylpha and Converge TS, dedicated cloud computing provider for law firms, have launched a joint report on the issues affecting IT in legal practices.
Called The Legal Landscape 2016, the report uses case management experience from firms and organisations that are currently investing in innovation to both drive efficiencies and boost client care. The many insightful contributions included come from: Anthony Collins, DAC Beachcroft, Genus Law, Olliers, Poole Alcock, South London Legal Partnership and Total Conveyancing Services.
Readers wishing to view a copy of the report online should visit: www.zylpha.com/legal-landscape-2016
You can read more recent wins, deals and people moves in the latest Legal IT Insider