Earlier this month, artificial intelligence was the talk of ILTACON 2024 in Nashville. Whether at conference sessions, conversations over coffee, or the exhibit hall, the possibilities — and challenges — of generative AI legal tools were front and center.
Everywhere you went, the excitement about AI’s potential and its impact on the practice of law was palpable, and everyone seemed to have an opinion about whether AI was going to truly change the practice of law. Many believed it was the most significant development in decades, while others suggested it was more akin to snake oil and that the hype was overblown.
Despite the varied perspectives, there was no escaping AI, especially in the exhibit hall. Nearly every vendor was selling the promise of AI, often through polished, recorded demos of products still in early development or beta testing.
However, it quickly became evident that the more complex AI software solutions that legal professionals truly need have been slower to emerge. Although there have been some quick, surface-level advancements, for the most part, it was clear that significant integration of AI into legal platforms will require more time to fully develop in a meaningful and impactful way.
Of course, rolling out AI functionality into existing platforms is more challenging than creating brand-new, limited-function legal AI software from the ground up. For that reason, it was no surprise to see AI dominating the “Startup Hub” section of the exhibit hall, with many innovative and focused legal AI tools on display.
The Start-up Hub vendors’ software fell primarily into a few key categories: case and practice management; document drafting, summary, and analysis; legal billing and pricing; and knowledge management and information governance. The vast majority of tools being showcased incorporated AI, with generative AI functionality being the primary selling point for many of them.
In between meetings with many more established legal technology companies, I made it a point to stop by many of the Startup Hub booths and speak to the company representatives, who often included the founders. I learned as much as I could about their products and motivations for developing them.
Based on those discussions, here are a few standout startups that caught my eye.
First, there’s Coheso, an AI platform that streamlines legal and compliance operations for in-house teams. Coheso’s key features include AI-generated responses for legal and compliance team members based on a company’s existing legal documents. Other functions included the ability to create customizable workflows for task delegation within legal teams and built-in analytics that provide key performance metrics, including request volume and SLAs.
Another notable platform was Legau, document drafting software designed to streamline the creation of all types of legal documents, from pleadings and memos to contracts. This software improves efficiency by providing AI-driven insights and suggestions throughout the drafting process and currently offers 23 different generative AI use cases. Legau integrates with and is accessible in Microsoft Word and Outlook.
Cicero by Automise is an Australian company that offers a private AI platform designed for legal professionals. The software relies on AI to automate document summarization, chronology preparation, and investigative research. A key selling point for Cicero is that its private AI system is designed to address ethics and security concerns with its SOC2 and ISO-compliant software.
Lastly, Lexpipe is an innovative AI-powered legal pricing platform. It assists with the strategic pricing of legal matters. It integrates billable hours with public litigation data and analyzes case status, type, and outcomes. Using this information, the software provides invaluable pricing insights that assist in developing accurate and profitable pricing models and alternative fee arrangements (AFAs), allowing law firms to compete more effectively in an increasingly competitive legal marketplace.
The AI-driven innovations showcased at ILTACON this year offer a glimpse of what’s possible as AI software development in the legal space continues. Platforms like Coheso, Legau, Cicero, and Lexpipe are great examples of how AI can improve legal workflows and provide convincing evidence that AI has the potential to significantly reshape the legal technology landscape.
While the journey to full integration into trusted legal products may be complex, there are significant opportunities for legal software developers. As standalone point solutions like those on display in the Startup Hub grow or are acquired and companies continue to develop and integrate AI into the trusted products legal professionals rely on every day, AI’s promise may soon come to fruition.
Now that ILTACON has drawn to a close, the question remains: Will AI transform, revolutionize, or significantly impact the practice of law? Maybe. Maybe not. Only time will tell, so tune in to next year’s ILTACON and see!
Nicole Black is a Rochester, New York attorney and Director of Business and Community Relations at MyCase, web-based law practice management software. She’s been blogging since 2005, has written a weekly column for the Daily Record since 2007, is the author of Cloud Computing for Lawyers, co-authors Social Media for Lawyers: the Next Frontier, and co-authors Criminal Law in New York. She’s easily distracted by the potential of bright and shiny tech gadgets, along with good food and wine. You can follow her on Twitter at @nikiblack and she can be reached at [email protected].
