Blickstein Group Legal AI Efficacy Report Cuts Through Market Hype

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Industry’s First Independent Comprehensive Review of AI-Powered Legal Tools Available for Discounted Preorder at ILTACON 2019

ORLANDO. AUGUST 19, 2019 – Blickstein Group today announces the launch of its Legal AI Efficacy Report, an independent analysis that evaluates the effectiveness of 50 AI-powered solutions currently available across eight different legal tech categories. The report, which will be sold on an annual subscription basis with quarterly updates, will be available for preorder at ILTACON 2019, with a 20 percent discount offered exclusively to ILTA members. The report will be delivered to subscribers on September 23 and quarterly after that.

Based on extensive research conducted over the past six months, the report provides the market with an unbiased, holistic look at AI products on the market, so that corporate law department and law firm leaders can make educated decisions based on their business goals. The report is written for users—no vendors can pay to be included or to influence the analysis.

The report is designed to help law departments and law firms develop an AI-enabled technology strategy and:

  • Cut through the hype to identify problems and solutions;
  • Understand which products and services are the best fit for common use cases; and
  • Gain a holistic view of technology categories and relevant vendor product offerings.

“‘Artificial intelligence-powered legal technology’ is not a phrase many industry veterans ever thought they’d hear, but law firms and law departments are now looking to develop an AI strategy,” says Brad Blickstein, principal at the Blickstein Group and publisher and co-author of the report. “Limited to hype-ridden information sources, however, organizations are ignoring the time-honored process of first identifying problems and then finding ways to solve them. The Legal AI Efficacy Report is designed to help them fix that.”

The report, co-authored by veteran legal journalist Erin Harrison (ALM Media, Legaltech News, InsideCounsel), offers a detailed investigation into each provider’s product and service offerings. Lawyer and legal technologist Dera Nevin is the report’s senior advisory editor.

Each product analysis is based on multiple factors, including the vendor’s own written responses to a questionnaire, a briefing with Blickstein Group researchers, interviews with independently identified product users (not the vendor’s references) and review by the report’s advisory board.

The advisory board members are all senior-level law firm, law department and legal technology experts: Reese Arrowsmith, VP, Head of Legal Operations at Campbell Soup Company; Amol Bargaje, Global Director – IT Practice and Client Solutions at Mayer Brown; Kamil Budny, Senior Legal Program Manager at Cisco; Laura A. Caponi, Head of Strategy and Operations – Legal and Compliance at Bristol-Myers Squibb; Katherine Lowry, Director of Practice Services at BakerHostetler; Jeff Marple, Director of Innovation at Liberty Mutual; Jim Michalowicz, Senior Manager – Legal Operations at TE Connectivity; Dera Nevin, Lawyer and Legal Technologist; Nancy Pedrick, Enterprise Support/Legal Commercial SMG at W. L. Gore & Associates, Inc.; Farrah Pepper, Chief Legal Innovation Counsel at Marsh & McLennan Companies; Ali Shahidi, Chief Innovation Officer at Sheppard Mullin; Daryl E. Shetterly, Director of Orrick Analytics at Orrick; Gabriel Walsh, Director of Legal Technology & Consulting Services at Alston & Bird; and Ben Weinberger, Legal Operations Director at Dentons Nextlaw.

Each of the individual reports includes the following sections: what problem the tool solves, how the tool solves the problem, customer profile, how AI fits in, user feedback, pricing, product roadmap and analysis including subsections such as ease of use, speed, implementation/training, language support, accuracy and additional functionality. Every report also includes at-a-glance SWOT charts to understand each tool’s pros and cons.

Annual subscriptions to the Blickstein Group Legal AI Efficacy Report can be purchased for $4,995 per year (or $3,996 with the ILTACON discount) and will include updates each quarter, which will cover new products as well as revisions to existing reviews when major product updates have occurred.

“The industry will welcome such a comprehensive, independent review of the many AI-powered technologies currently available on the market,” says Joy Heath Rush, CEO of ILTA. “With the steady stream of product updates and new players constantly emerging, this report is a valuable, time-saving resource. We are excited to support the initiative and be able to extend this special offer to our members.”

For more information, or to purchase the Legal AI Efficacy Report, please visit www.legalaireport.com.

About Blickstein Group

Blickstein Group, Inc. has two missions: to help legal service providers better understand and serve their clients and to provide information about law departments, legal technology and legal operations. Its principal, Brad Blickstein, has more than 25 years of experience providing data, analytical acumen and strategic advice. Blickstein Group’s flagship research products include National Law Journal Trailblazers, The GDPR Reality Check, The Annual Study of Effective Legal Spend Management, The Annual Law Department Operations Survey and, most recently, the Legal AI Efficacy Report. To learn more about the Blickstein Group, visit blicksteingroup.com, or connect with Brad on Twitter.

Media Contact

Erin Harrison

erin@blicksteingroup.com

203-610-9492

Blickstein Group Announces Advisory Board for Legal AI Efficacy Report

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Blickstein Group Announces Advisory Board for Legal AI Efficacy Report
Law firm and law department leaders will advise on industry’s first comprehensive analysis of legal AI-based tools

March 21, 2019—Blickstein Group, Inc. today names the members of its Legal AI Efficacy Report Advisory Board, a group of law firm and legal department innovation leaders who will guide and advise on the forthcoming industry report, which is due to publish in Q3 2019. The advisory board members are:

Reese Arrowsmith, VP, Head of Legal Operations, Campbell Soup Company
Amol Bargaje, Global Director – IT Practice and Client Solutions, Mayer Brown
Kamil Budny, Senior Legal Program Manager, Cisco
Laura A. Caponi, Head of Operations – Legal and Compliance, Bristol-Myers Squibb
Katherine Lowry, Director of Practice Services, BakerHostetler
Jeff Marple, Director of Innovation, Liberty Mutual
Jim Michalowicz, Senior Manager, Legal Operations Business Performance, TE Connectivity
Dera Nevin, Senior Associate, IPTech, Info Gov and E-Discovery, Baker & McKenzie
Nancy Pedrick, W. L. Gore & Associates, Inc., Enterprise Support/Legal Commercial
Farrah Pepper, Chief Legal Innovation Counsel, Marsh & McLennan Companies
Ali Shahidi, Chief Innovation Officer, Sheppard Mullin
Daryl E. Shetterly, Director of Orrick Analytics, Orrick

“Our advisory board plays a pivotal role in guiding our research process as we embark on the industry’s first comprehensive analysis of legal AI tools,” said Brad Blickstein, principal of Blickstein Group. “Based on our early due diligence, all corners of the industry — legal operations, law firms, legal service providers and end users — are in dire need of an independent analysis of legal AI tools based strictly on their ability to solve legal and business problems. We are appreciative to be working with such an esteemed group of law firm and legal department leaders who will be critical to the success of our reports and findings.”

The Legal AI Efficacy Report will cover legal tech companies with an AI-based product. As an independent analysis, the report will evaluate how effective an AI-based tool is at solving real problems for legal professionals; therefore, only companies with existing clients using the technology will be covered.

“Based on the board’s collective experience and knowledge, the support of this advisory group is critical to ensuring we properly cover every aspect of how legal AI tools function and evaluating their effectiveness to solve problems for law firms and law departments,” said Erin Harrison, executive editor of the Legal AI Efficacy Report. “Brad and I are both humbled and honored to be working alongside this group of highly regarded industry leaders.”

To be included in the Legal AI Efficacy Report, submissions are due March 29. For information on criteria and access to submission forms, click here.

Blickstein Group also publishes the Annual Law Department Operations Survey, which was created in 2008 to give law departments a consistent platform to benchmark themselves and shed light on the emerging profession of law department management. It is the largest,
oldest and most comprehensive law department operations survey in the marketplace, with more than 300 unique data points and more than a hundred different responding law departments.

About Blickstein Group, Inc.

Founded by trusted legal industry advisor Brad Blickstein in 2002, the Blickstein Group has two missions: to help legal service providers better understand and serve their clients and to provide information about law departments, legal technology and legal operations. Blickstein has spent his entire career bridging the gap between in-house counsel, law firms and legal service providers. In 2008, he launched the Annual Law Department Operations (LDO) Survey, at a time when few law departments had a legal ops function. Blickstein is a regular columnist on the topic for Above the Law and Legaltech News. For more information, please visit www.blicksteingroup.com.

Contact
Erin Harrison
203/610-9492
erin@blicksteingroup.com

For a PDF version of this press release, click here.

Legal Technology Experts Collaborate on ‘AI Efficacy Report’

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Veteran legal journalist Erin Harrison joins Blickstein Group to spearhead research and expand the firm’s strategy and marketing practice

January 28, 2019­—Trusted legal industry advisor Brad Blickstein and veteran legal journalist Erin Harrison have teamed up to launch the Blickstein Group Legal AI Efficacy Report, the industry’s first comprehensive review of all AI-based legal technologies. The report will provide the independent analysis needed to evaluate what legal AI tools do—and how effective each actually is. Harrison will lead the project as its executive editor.

The Legal AI Efficacy Report will provide law firm leaders, legal operations professionals and other technology decision makers with detailed, no-holds-barred insight into each product, what problem it is designed to solve and how effective it is in solving that problem. The report will include:

  • Quantitative rankings (based on efficacy).
  • Complete, detailed reviews of each tool on their ability to solve legal and business problems, including user interviews.
  • Analysis across eight distinct technology categories: E-discovery; legal research; billing/spend management; contract/document review and analysis; contract assembly and creation; expertise automation; insight/predictive tools; and other tools.

Blickstein, principal of Blickstein Group, has published the seminal Annual Law Department Operations Survey since 2008. The annual report includes more than 100 respondents and 300 data points. Combined, Blickstein and Harrison have more than four decades of experience delivering independent information and analysis to the legal community, which makes them uniquely qualified to provide the independent thought and analysis the marketplace needs.

“I am thrilled to be collaborating with Erin as the legal industry continues to question the relevance and need for AI-based tools to advance their value and meet client expectations,” Blickstein said. “There has been too much focus on AI in the abstract and not enough on which problems AI-enabled tools can actually solve. We endeavor to fix that.”

In addition to serving as executive editor of the Legal AI Efficacy Report, Harrison will also work with legal technology companies to develop and execute communications strategies that help them achieve their business goals.

“Every legal AI company claims their technology solves a critical problem for law firms and in-house legal departments, but not all are created equal. At the same time, many buyers do not fully understand the potential use cases, let alone which AI technologies actually do as they prescribe,” Harrison said. “I am incredibly excited to partner with Brad on this vital initiative for the legal market.”

An accomplished legal journalist and content strategist, Harrison was at the helm of two of the industry’s most prominent media brands as editor-in-chief of ALM Media’s Legaltech News and InsideCounsel. Most recently, she worked with legal tech companies as a managing director at Baretz+Brunelle, a New York City-based strategic communications firm, helping them craft and deliver important messages and insights to the marketplace.

For more information, contact Brad at (847) 256-5298 or brad@blicksteingroup.com.

To schedule an interview, contact Erin at (203) 610-9492 or erin@blicksteingroup.com.

About Blickstein Group, Inc.

Founded by trusted legal industry advisor Brad Blickstein in 2002, the Blickstein Group advises legal service providers to better understand and serve their in-house legal department and law firm clients. Blickstein has spent his entire career bridging the gap between in-house counsel, law firms and legal service providers. In 2008, he launched the Annual Law Department Operations (LDO) Survey, at a time when few law departments had a legal ops function. Blickstein is a regular columnist on the topic for Above the Law and Legaltech News. For more information, please visit www.blicksteingroup.com.