Wolters Kluwer Legal & Regulatory U.S. continues to expand suite of securities law and workflow products with today’s launch of Capital Markets Clause Analytics. Similar to the M&A Clause Analytics which they launched in 201?, CAPA offers a workflow solution that leverages artificial intelligence and expert human curation. CAPA is the latest addition to Wolters Kluwer’s Transactional Law Suite for Securities, promises to bring new efficiencies to capital markets document drafting workflow. The tool enhanced both knowledge management and competitive intelligence efforts. Law firms use COPA to benchmark their own deals and clauses as well as benchmarking the firm against deals and clauses done by specific competitor law firms or the market as a whole. All of the documents have been extensively coded which provides lawyers with powerful tools for to filtering and focusing on specific deal and clause types.

Capital Markets Clause Analytics Home Page

 

The press release quotes Susan Chain, Esq. Portfolio Director for Securities and Banking at Wolters Kluwer Legal & Regulatory U.S. “As clients continue to aggressively pursue improved cost efficiency and timeliness from legal providers, legal professionals are in need of workflow solutions that address their most critical pain points.We developed Capital Markets Clause Analytics to integrate powerful technology with our domain expertise to transform the Capital Markets drafting process, boost our customers’ productivity and improve their ROI.”


 

Features

Capital Markets Clause Analytics streamlines the Capital Markets drafting and negotiating process for securities law professionals with:
• Custom Model Agreements: Users can create a custom model based on their unique criteria, search across a database of more than one million individual clauses, analyze agreements clause by clause, and compare their findings to their own agreements and clauses;
• Practical Guidance: Expertly prepared practical guidance, such as elements of the clause checklists, drafting considerations, and intent of the clause, are shown alongside individual clauses, enhancing your understanding at the point of need, instantly surfacing drafting risks, and eliminating the potential for costly mistakes; and
• Benchmarking: Users can enhance their efficiency and boost negotiating leverage with statistics and comparisons based on their specific deal criteria. Several comparison tools allow professionals to efficiently benchmark your own agreements and clauses, providing insight of drafting techniques used by specific law firms or industries.

Since there is a frenzied competition in the litigation analytics market it is good to see Wolters Kluwer expanding the use of analytics to provide insights for transactional lawyers.

To learn more about the Capital Markets Clause Analytics and the power of the entire Transactional Law Suite for Securities, visit: https://lrus.wolterskluwer.com/store/transactional-law-suite/

 

 

I was traveling this week, so I will provide a summary of some legal information and technology highlights.

Fastcase and Florida Bar Launch Case Alerts

Fastcase which seems to have a weekly product launch or feature enhancement – did not disappoint this week. On Tuesday they announced that in collaboration with the Florida Bar they had launched Case Alerts, a daily report of court decisions in key practice areas. The subscription-only service introduced Florida Family Law Alerts, a daily e-mail summary of family law decisions from Florida courts. Fastcase and The Florida Bar will roll out new Florida practice areas throughout the summer, including business law, real property, probate, trusts, and tax law alerts. Read more at this link.

Thomson Reuters Added Jurisdictional Surveys to Westlaw Edge

On Monday Thomson Reuters announced the release of Jurisdictional Surveys, The press release describes the features as allowing users to “quickly retrieve a customized and relevant compilation of laws across all U.S. jurisdictions on virtually any topic.”  My first reaction to Thomson Reuters press release on jurisdictional surveys was to wonder how this feature if different from their 50 state survey offering. I plan to have a demo and will report back on what I learn.

Bloomberg Ending UK Court Coverage

A Bloomberg  Law executive  explained  to me that use of the UK materials had declined and that there were legal Continue Reading Weekly Round Up – Fastcase Adds Case Alerts; TR Adds Jurisdictional Surveys; Bloomberg Law Ends UK Coverage; New Exhibitors at AAALL — Innovation Survey!

I will be moderating a hot topic program at the Special Libraries Association Annual Conference in Cleveland. The Event is sponsored by Lucidea. Don’t Just Be Integral: Be Aligned.

 

Building on the themes drawn out during last year’s successful Lucidea-sponsored session, “Don’t Just Be Integrated, Be Integral”, we will present the next in our SLA Hot Topics series on special library sustainability, during which we’ll explore what a special librarian’s mission truly is, and why it encompasses even more than skills, experience, services and approach. The path to success and sustainability includes applying your tools and skills in support of the top-level mission and goals—and adapting the library’s services and deliverables so you’re always aligned with what’s most important to senior leadership.

Time: Monday, June 17, 2019. 9:00am – 10:30am

  • How do you prioritize and delegate projects based on alignment?
  • What are some strategies for partnering and leveraging other departments?
  • How do you practice alignment without guilt?

Panelists

  • Moderator: Jean O`Grady, Director of Research and Knowledge Services. DLA Piper
  • Cindy Moon-Barna, Director, CASE Library. C.A.S.E.
  • Karen MQuillen, Executive Director, Connect. ETS
  • Annette L. Demers, Law Librarian. University of Windsor Faculty of Law

The program will be followed by a panelist Q&A in the afternoon.

It seems like only yesterday that Joan Axelroth and I were Co-Chairs of the 2012 PLL Summit themed as “The Road to 2020.”   That year’s Keynote Speaker was Jordan Furlong, a leading legal industry consultant who inspired the audience with a talk entitled  “Climbing the Value Ladder. Rethinking the Law Library on the Road to 2020” 

Keynote: Jordan Furlong

Furlong is back and this years Summit theme is “The Road to 2030.”  In retrospect, many of Furlong’s predictions about the transformation of libraries and the morphing of librarians into a wide spectrum of knowledge and technology roles have materialized. I am looking forward to another inspiring Furlong road map suggesting how we should respond to the changes ahead.

The keynote will highlight how the growing power and sophistication of legal intelligence will dovetail with and help to accelerate the transformation of law firms’ client services and business models. Furlong will describe how law librarians, knowledge engineers, and data analysts will play Continue Reading Registration Closing for PLLIP Summit: The Road to 2030 with Jordon Furlong Keynote and Design Thinking Workshop

Today Lex Machina a LexisNexis product, is launching an Environmental Analytics module which provides insights on nearly 14,700 environmental cases pending in federal court since 2009.  This is the fourteenth module in the Lex Machina suite of products. The product provides previously unreported data, e.g.  more than $22 billion in damages have been awarded in environmental litigation cases over the last decade. High profile cases Continue Reading Lex Machina Launches Environmental Analytics Product: Hosting Webcast June 11th

Almost all players in the legal market talk about innovation. Law firms start incubators, clients demand innovation, and providers promote their innovative solutions. But just what is innovation, who’s doing it, and how do rank and file legal market workers handle it?  I am moderating a Hot Topic panel at AALL  Embracing Sustainable Innovation – Building a Future Focused Library. To prepare for a conference,  the panelists are seeking to answer these questions by conducting an anonymous survey. I hope you will participate. Please click here.

BACKGROUND – CONFERENCE SESSION PROMPTING THE SURVEY: I will be a panelist on Sunday, July 14, at 11:30am in Washington, DC at the American Association of Law Libraries (AALL) annual conference. The session is Hot Topic: Embracing Sustainable Innovation Initiatives to Build a Future-Focused Library. The session description appears Continue Reading Law Firm Innovation Survey For AALL Conference “Hot Topic” Panel- Results in July

Casemaker has announced the launch of Casemaker4 – a “next generation” research platform with a new look, faster search and expanded functionality New features were added based on extensive testing and user feedback. New features include: alerts delivered via email; advanced search opinions; predictive “type ahead” functionality; and “intelligent algorithms” which suggest related primary and secondary materials related to the research query.   Casemaker4 is positioned in the low cost online research market which has benefited from the convergence of  algorithms, legal text investment and market frustration with the high cost of products from the largest vendors: Thomson Reuters, LexisNexis and Bloomberg.

Demos are available from Casemaker upon request.

Here is the press release

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE June 3, 2019 Contact: Norman Woolworth

Telephone: 434-220-4309

Toll-Free: 877-659-0801 Email: nwoolworth@casemakerlegal.com Web Site: www.casemakerus.com

Casemaker Launches Next Generation Research Platform Casemaker4 brings new look, faster searching, expanded functionality

Charlottesville, VA, June 3, 2019 – Casemaker today announced the formal launch of its next generation legal research platform, Casemaker4. Beginning today, all Casemaker subscribers have access to Casemaker4, which features a redesigned user interface and leverages improved search speed and more intuitive site navigation to deliver faster results.

“We are thrilled to announce the release of Casemaker4,” said Sarah Gorman, Chief Operating Officer at Casemaker. “The new platform is informed by several years of user feedback and an extensive beta testing process. The response from the last round of beta was overwhelmingly positive and we are extremely excited to now open up Casemaker4 to our entire subscriber base.”

In creating Casemaker4, the development team was presented with two overarching imperatives:

On the one hand, improve search speed, modernize the interface to enable more intuitive site navigation, and upgrade design responsiveness to better accommodate mobile devices; On the other hand, retain features and design elements that loyal Casemaker users value and trust, and minimize changes with the potential to disorient.

“In other words: Make it new, make it better, but avoid change for change’s sake,” said Casemaker Chief Information Officer Dan McCade. “The history of platform re-designs is littered with examples of solutions in search of problems. We were determined to only add features that would matter to our users, and to not throw out the baby with the bath water, so to speak.”

According to McCade, expanded feature functionality on Casemaker4 includes a new Alerts feature that enables a user to have new developments in areas of interest delivered straight to her in box; an expanded Search Input Box with an Advanced Search option; predictive “Type Ahead” functionality; and the incorporation of intelligent algorithms to suggest related primary and secondary materials not previously displayed.

In third party testing* Casemaker has been shown to consistently return more relevant results than other low cost legal research services, while also featuring more thorough and up-to-date primary law content sets, and a more precise and less cumbersome negative citator, CaseCheck+.

“Now, with the launch of Casemaker4, our subscribers can enjoy the best of both worlds,” Gorman said. “A much improved platform with state-of-the-art functionality, and content they can continue to rely on with confidence.”

Demos are available upon request.

*The study may be found at http://casemakerlegal.com/pdf/public/database-comparision.pdf.

 

* * * About Casemaker: Casemaker focuses on a single mission: providing attorneys with affordable access to high quality legal research. Available for free to members of almost 30 bar associations, and to nonmembers at a fraction of the cost charged by “premium” providers, the Casemaker legal research system offers full federal and 50-state primary law coverage that is often more current than that provided by the leading high-cost services. For more information, please visit www.casemakerus.com. Casemaker is a division of Lawriter®, LLC.

Only weeks after Wolters Kluwer was in news for surviving a malware attack, today there is happier news.  Dean Sonderegger has been named SVP & General Manager of Wolters Kluwer Legal & Regulatory . He succeeds former LRUS head Greg Samios who was recently named as President & CEO of the Wolters Kluwer Health division’s global Health Learning, Research & Practice.  Sonderreger has decades of experience in the legal technology and publishing space. Most recently he was, he was Executive Director of Product Management and Marketing at Bloomberg BNA. At Wolters Kluwer Sonderegger  has spearheaded customer-focused innovation to enhance legal professionals’ Continue Reading Dean Sonderegger Named SVP & General Manager of Wolters Kluwer Legal & Regulatory

Today Bloomberg Law announced the expansion of Litigation Practice Guidance which includes overviews, checklists, sample forms and filings that are organized around the litigation process. They are structured to guide attorneys through each phase of initiating and defending litigation– addressing both legal and logistical issues. A new Litigation Resources page organizes the key research tools and reference materials needed for daily practice, including statutes of limitations, jury instructions, court rules, laws, and regulations. The guidance resources enhance and link to the litigation resources which where already on Bloomberg Law  including  Points of Law, Smart Codes and their outstanding docket resources.

Joe Breda, The President of Bloomberg Law and Mindy Rattan who oversees the development of litigation content. provided me with an overview of the product. Breda described Litigation Practice Guidance as providing “reliable answers in the shortest amount of time.”  As law firms have embraced the “gospel of efficiency”  Bloomberg Law and their legal publishing competitors have responded by moving away from the esoteric treatise toward the practical roadmap and one-stop resource center. in 2011 Bloomberg acquired the Bureau of National Affairs which had pioneered practical guidance with their Tax and Corporate Practice Portfolios. According to Breda, the Litigation portfolios remain available in the Litigation Practice Center, but the Litigation Practical Guidance materials are the result of a new initiative headed up by Mindy Rattan. These resources are authored by expert practitioners rather than by legal editors. They will continue to build out content and have already announced that new resources will cover Special Defenses and Discovery.

The Litigation Practice Guidance includes:

 

  • Topical overviews, checklist and forms
  • Links to related content (e.g. dockets, patents)
  • Points of law providing key legal principles in court opinions
  • Smart Code provides up-to-date judicial interpretations of statues rules and regulations
  • Practice tips guidance written by expert practitioners

 

LITIGATION GUIDANCE OVERVIEW

 

TEMPLATE FOR MOTION DRAFTING

Template for Drafting a Motion 

INTERACTIVE STATUTES OF LIMITIATIONS MAP

Interactive state statutes of limitations map

Market Position: The two main competitors to Litigation Guidance are LexisNexis Practice Advisor and Thomson Reuters Practical Law. Practical Law  started in the UK and since its acquisition by TR has become the dominant practical guidance product in the U. S.. Like other TR products, Practical Law is a “high ticket” product.  TR has also morphed and divided their Practical Law product into multiple “flavors” of Practical Law — achieving two unintended outcomes– diluting the  Practical Law brand and annoying their customers. Price sensitive customers are looking for alternatives. Since Litigation Guidance is available to anyone with a Bloomberg Law Subscription – this could begin to erode Practical Law use in firms with access to Bloomberg Law.  But in order to move the market – Bloomberg needs to develop more guidance materials for more practice areas.  For now, they are off to a promising start.

Availability: As with all enhancements to the Bloomberg Law platform, this new Litigation Practical Guidance and the accompanying Litigation Resources expansion are available to Bloomberg Law subscribers at no additional cost.

Demo: Request a demo at this link.

Is Casetext’s SmartCite poised to disrupt the legal research market? But it is just a citator right? Why would that be?  One of the reasons that LexisNexis® and Thomson Reuters have been able to maintain their dominance of the legal research market is the strength and reputation of their citation systems. Shepards dates back to 1873 but was acquired by the parent of  LexisNexis® 1996.  Thomson Reuters launched KeyCite and 1997. The development of Key Cite uses technology to leverage Thomson Reuters  editorial expertise and the deep archive of editorial materials. In 2018 it was enhanced with a an advanced “Overruling risk” feature in Westlaw Edge. In the past decade Bloomberg Law is rumored to have spent $600 million building their BCite citator.
None of the lower cost competitors that have emerged over the past two decades have deep editorial legacies to draw upon or a “deep pocket” owner like Mike Bloomberg. Lower-cost legal research competitors have needed to develop algorithms to even compete in this space. Several years ago Fastcase developed the Bad Law Bot to address  the negative history of cases. Casemaker and Ross have also offered a negative history citator. Google Scholar appears to have taken a pass on developing a citator to enhance their caselaw offering. The development of a citator is not for the feint of heart. And until now it was only for companies with deep pockets.
Drumroll Please – Enter the Low Cost Caselaw Citator
Like other citators Casetext SmartCite alerts lawyers to the negative treatment of cases and to other cases they should read. Citation tools mitigate risk and drive efficiency by helping lawyers identify and focus on the most relevant cases for their issue. SmartCite goes beyond the standard  positive treatment(green), negative treatment (green) and neutral treatment (yellow). They have also come up with a orange flag similar to the “overruling risk” flag which was released last summer by Thomson Reuters in Westlaw Edge.
Below are the 6 mail features of SmartCite
1) red/green/yellow flags;
2) orange flags the case relies heavily on an negatively treated case but the case you are reading has not been overrules ( and looks like a reliable precedent)
3) a ” CARA-fied” citation list  (meaning CARA will provide context-specific list of citing cases)
4) Emphasis added (shows you when a specific word/phrase was not just quoted but emphasized in later decision)
5) Judicial summaries of how case A treats case B
 6) “Similar Issues”  turns any paragraph into a type of headnote
SmartCite Emphasis Added
Casetext has posted an interview with Pablo Arredondo, Casetext Co-founder and Chief Product Officer on their website   which provides some fascinating legal history trivia – the first citiator was developed in  1807 by an attorney named Greenleaf who had been humiliated in court by citing to an overruled case.( Who knew?) Arredondo also explains how they have used legal informative which were brought together in SmartCite. I love the fact that they have used AI/machine learning and editorial expertise  to surface things like judicial summaries or judge authored “explanatory parentheticals.” They use similar technology to identify the emphasis added in an otherwise identical quotation. Smart lawyers with advanced technology have a shot at leveling the playing field.
Market Impact. There is no such thing as a perfect citator. Lawyers still need to read cases.
For those who are plugging for some lower cost product or combination or products  which can challenge the dominance of the high ticket legacy products,  Casetext’s SmartCite could be a reason to celebrate.
It will take a lot of testing for the large law market to embrace yet another citiation product, but the market may be ready. There has been a growing risk from a generation of lawyers who grew up on texts and tweets who may not have the patience or perhaps even stamina to read and interpret 50 page judicial opinions. Lawyers have always been  tempted to outsource the interpretation of cases to citators . The current generation of citation systems are getting better and better at delivering a variety of insights for a lawyer’s consideration. No citator, no matter how esteemed relieves a lawyer of the responsibility of reading the cases which a citator leads them to. No citator, no matter how iconic is without error.  In this context, an upstart like Casetext’s SmartCite could, if it survives the  harsh “road testing” in the coming months…could erode the Lexis/Westaw/Bloomberg Law tri-opoly.