Technology

Cloud Practice Management Software Grows Up

Just 10 years ago, the "cloud" was a scary proposition for lawyers. Times have changed.

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Can a single market in a single week see both upheaval and stabilization? It seemed that way last week for the market of cloud-based law practice management software, which had its most momentous week of company news ever, a week that brought major adjustments to key players. But what may have looked, at first glance, like upheaval, actually reflected the fact that cloud practice management has finally matured to the point where there is no doubt it is to be taken seriously.

It was oddly karmic that so many major industry news stories broke in the same week, because last Monday happened to be the 10th anniversary of the launch of Clio, the company that, together with Rocket Matter, ignited a revolution in law practice management by bringing to the cloud what had always been desktop technology.

Those companies sparked a slew of similar companies and made cloud-based practice management one of the most competitive areas of legal technology of the last decade. For 10 years, we’ve witnessed any number of companies come into this market. But we’ve seen little market correction, with the notable exception of LexisNexis’s decision in 2017 to shut down its practice management platform, Firm Manager.

Then came last week. Let’s recap the major news:

While these stories suggest upheaval in the market, they also reflect the degree to which this market has matured. In the early years after Clio and Rocket Matter launched their cloud-based products, many in the legal industry harbored doubt and even fear about the viability and safety of the cloud. Now, the cloud-based systems have come to dominate and define this market.

The Tabs3 acquisition of CosmoLex illustrates this. Tabs3 is a well-established desktop product, in business nearly 40 years, with a loyal customer base. But Dan Berlin, Tabs3 president and CEO, said he is increasingly hearing from customers who want the convenience and mobility of the cloud. By acquiring CosmoLex, he could give them that option. And as an acquisition, CosmoLex was a good match for Tabs3. An “all-in-one” platform with an array of standard features and robust accounting, CosmoLex mirrored the Tabs3 product.

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The maturing of the market is also reflected in the PracticePanther news. By all accounts, PracticePanther has experienced rapid growth over the past two years, reportedly gaining a sizeable share of the market. (Unfortunately, determining market share is largely guesswork.) Its investors no doubt see an opportunity for even greater growth. It therefore made sense to bring in a business professional to lead the company into its next stage.

With this maturing of the market has come stabilization. This is evident among several of the other established players in this market, most notably MyCase, Rocket Matter, Thomson Reuters Firm Central, and Zola, all of which continue to steadily build and refine their products. As a matter of fact, Rocket Matter was among the practice management companies making news last week — not for upheaval, but for a new round of enhancements to its product.

Both MyCase (recent updates) and Firm Central (recent updates) also maintain a steady course of development and refinement. Each of these companies has built a solid base of committed customers and each appears to be continuing along a steady course of growth.

But the company that dominated the practice management news last week was Clio. No other company so symbolizes the maturation and stabilization of the cloud practice management market. On its 10th anniversary, Clio is the 800-pound gorilla of practice management. With 150,000 users in 90 countries, more than 300 employees, and more than 120 app integration partners, it dwarfs its competitors in size.

But perhaps more significantly for Clio than size, it has established itself as a key force in driving development and innovation in law — not just for itself, but across the industry more broadly. Clio defines its mission as “changing the practice of law, for good,” with “for good” intentionally having the dual meaning of “for the better” and “forever.”

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Clio is building an ecosystem of applications that extend its capabilities beyond practice management to all facets of law practice. This year, Clio initiated its Launch/Code competition, in which it awarded $100,000 to the “most creative, powerful and useful” app integration with Clio. (I was a judge of this year’s competition, where the winner was voice time-tracking app Tali.) Next year, it plans to launch its own incubator.

This sense of Clio as a force within the industry is keenly palpable at the Cloud Cloud Conference, which convened for its sixth year last week. With 1,500 attendees, industry-leading speakers and major-name keynoters, this has become one of the most important and influential conferences in law. The man at the helm of all this, CEO Jack Newton, who along with Rian Gauvreau founded the company in 2007, has himself become a leading influencer in legal technology and mentor to legal tech startups.

I say all this not to heap undue praise on a single company. There are several strong products in this market with dynamic and committed companies and people behind them. But Clio is Exhibit A for how this market has matured. A feisty and unproven upstart just 10 years ago, it is now a mature, established, well-funded company that plays a pivotal role in defining the market and driving innovation, both through its vision for itself and through its mentorship and encouragement of other companies.

For the legal professionals who consume these products, this maturing and stabilization of the market can only be good news. No longer need they fear that the cloud is an iffy proposition. No longer need they worry about the viability of cloud providers or the security of their platforms. Cloud practice management is a mature and stable market offering a rich array of products and the promise of continuing development and innovation.

Robert Ambrogi Bob AmbrogiRobert Ambrogi is a Massachusetts lawyer and journalist who has been covering legal technology and the web for more than 20 years, primarily through his blog LawSites.com. Former editor-in-chief of several legal newspapers, he is a fellow of the College of Law Practice Management and an inaugural Fastcase 50 honoree. He can be reached by email at ambrogi@gmail.com, and you can follow him on Twitter (@BobAmbrogi).

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