Today LexisNexis is announcing the launch of Lexis+ Litigation Analytics. Litigation Analytics does two things. It integrates analytics into the research and practical guidance  workflow.  Lexis+  now offers “enhanced analytics” from Lex Machina as well as state level analytics derived from CourtLink for the states that Lex Machina does not currently cover.
Karl Harris, C.E.O. of Lex Machina a offered me a demonstration of Lexis + Litigation Analytics.. Harris placed analytics within the context of the new workflow which was introduced with Lexis+.  Lexis+ includes a persistent navigation bar which today adds litigation analytics to the 3 original  pillars of,  Lexis + : workflow: research, practical guidance and brief analysis. The Lexis + home page  is designed around an inviting query “What would you like to research today”  hovering over a large search box.  Analytics are still fairly new to the average  lawyer’s toolkit and I think it is wise to remind lawyers about analytics throughout Lexis+ workflow experience..
Harris explained that the core goals of the Lexis+ enhancement was based on customer feedback which highlighted the importance of   accuracy confidence and efficiency in analytics products. In addition they wanted to  deliver an integrated product experience in what Lexis refers to as the Lexis+ ecosystem.

 Lexis+ Litigation Analytics offers the following types of insights:

  • Judge and court analytics: Contextualize understanding of federal district and state courts and judges.
  • Courts & Judges Comparator Quick Tool: Compare judge behavior and courtroom trends over time in federal district court.
  • Attorney and law firm analytics: Assess the experience of attorneys and law firms in federal district and state courts.
  • Counsel Comparator Quick Tool: Compare law firm and attorney performance based on actual results in federal district court.

Bifurcated Data: Enhanced Analytics and “everything else”

Enhanced analytics   Lex Machina data which is created using the natural language processing to extract data from court filings is the bases for the “enhanced analytics” in Lexis+
Timing charts  like the one below based on Lex Machina data are available with the Lexis+ experience for federal cases and those states have have launched in the Lex Machina platform.
CourtLink Analytics.(Everything Else) There is also a more bare-bones set of state data which comes from CourtLink, a docket tracking system owned by LexisNexis®. For the 40 plus states which are not currently included in Lex Machina, Lexis+ offers more bare bones analytics covering the volume of litigation  by court, judge and law firm. This can also be analyzed by litigation type. CourtLink has a taxonomy including 30 to 40 litigation types which have been normalized across the 50 states. The Courtlink data covers cases from 2016 to present. The CourtLink data does not include the data such as  damages or remedies which can only be identified used the sophisticated machine learning which creates the Lex Machina data.
Courtlink Law firm report by state.
Harris indicated that Lexis’ goal is to be equivalent to their competitors. But  the notion of “equivalence” is a fraught concept in analytics.  There are  literally hundreds of variables across the data collected, analyzed or enhanced when comparing analytics offered by Lexis and their competitors: Westlaw Edge. Bloomberg Law and Fastcase Docket Alarm. I am reluctant to believe any claim of superiority or even equivalence without  data  ( a massive spreadsheet of datapoints for each system) to back the claim up. Nonetheless. it was a smart move or LexisNexis to leverage the available data from both Lex Machina and CourtLink in order to dramatically expand the state analytics in Lexis+ to cover both federal courts and all 50 states.
A report on a law firm will include a sophisticated Lex Machina  data report which is followed by  a separate CourtLink analytics report. I warned Harris that some users may not be happy with having to review two different reports to get a comprehensive view of a law firms experience across multiple jurisdictions.
The Litigation Analytics Scrum As a customer of litigation analytics I am delighted to watch vendors compete so intensely to build out comprehensive state analytics products. I am a big believer that the “perfect can be the enemy of the good,” so I understand the tradeoffs Lexis had to make in launching Lexis+ Litigation analytics including data from two different sources (Lex Machina and CourtLink). The results are somewhat inelegant but I have to agree the CourtLink data will provide valuable insights to lawyers with access to Lexis+.
Here is the full press release:

LexisNexis Adds Lexis+ Litigation Analytics to the Lexis+ Ecosystem 

Accurate, relevant, data-driven insights from Lex Machina and CourtLink give Lexis+ users a powerful toolset for litigation analytics in a single integrated workflow

NEW YORK, January 19, 2021LexisNexis® Legal & Professional, a leading global provider of information and analytics, today announced the addition of Lexis+ Litigation Analytics to the Lexis+ ecosystem, the industry’s only end-to-end litigation experience designed for results at every stage. Powered by Lex Machina’s pioneering technology and CourtLink’s unrivaled docket coverage, Lexis+ Litigation Analytics delivers big-picture analytics via a modern user experience to inform and drive confidence in litigation.

 

Lexis+ Litigation Analytics delivers relevant, high-level insights and comparisons that help legal practitioners understand the factors that matter most – judicial experience and the expertise of opposing and outside counsel. The insights are extracted from millions of downloaded court documents and enhanced with proprietary technology for greater depth, accuracy, and comprehensiveness. Lexis+ Litigation Analytics integrates these insights and comparisons throughout the Lexis+ ecosystem and directly into established research workflows.

 

“Lexis+ accelerates every aspect of the litigation experience – research, knowledge, legal intelligence, and document drafting, enabling practitioners to do their jobs more effectively and efficiently,” said Sean Fitzpatrick, CEO, LexisNexis North America. “With Lexis+ Litigation Analytics, LexisNexis has made analytics more accessible to a broader range of practitioners to help them achieve more desirable legal outcomes.”

 

LexisNexis looked to the technology of its flagship analytics company, Lex Machina, to power the litigation analytics features in Lexis+ so that the two products naturally complement each other. Lexis+ Litigation Analytics was designed specifically for the Lexis+ ecosystem, to be used alongside Research, Practice Guidance and Brief Analysis, and brings high-level analytics into the Lexis+ workflow that litigators and researchers already know. Lex Machina continues to lead the field as the premier analytics product with comprehensive case resolutions, damages, remedies, and findings to land more clients and win more cases.

 

“Litigation Analytics is a powerful addition to the Lexis+ ecosystem, delivering critical, high-level insights about particular courts, judges, law firms, and attorneys to practitioners — no matter where they are within the litigation process,” said Karl Harris, CEO of Lex Machina. “The investments LexisNexis has made in analytics ensure that Lex Machina and all of our analytics tools and data are the best, most powerful, and most accurate in the industry.”

 

Among the many benefits and applications for Lexis+ Litigation Analytics, legal professionals can explore:

  • Judge and court analytics: Contextualize understanding of federal district and state courts and judges.
  • Courts & Judges Comparator Quick Tool: Compare judge behavior and courtroom trends over time in federal district court.
  • Attorney and law firm analytics: Assess the experience of attorneys and law firms in federal district and state courts.
  • Counsel Comparator Quick Tool: Compare law firm and attorney performance based on actual results in federal district court.

 

For more information on Lexis+ features and pricing, please visit www.lexisnexis.com/lexisplus.

 

About LexisNexis Legal & Professional

LexisNexis Legal & Professional is a leading global provider of legal, regulatory and business information and analytics that help customers increase productivity, improve decision-making and outcomes, and advance the rule of law around the world. As a digital pioneer, the company was the first to bring legal and business information online with its Lexis® and Nexis® services. LexisNexis Legal & Professional, which serves customers in more than 150 countries with 10,600 employees worldwide, is part of RELX, a global provider of information-based analytics and decision tools for professional and business customers.

 

About Lex Machina

Having just recently celebrated the 10th anniversary of Legal Analytics, the Lex Machina platform fundamentally changes how companies and law firms compete in the business and practice of law. The company provides strategic insights on judges, lawyers, law firms, parties, and other critical information across 16 federal practice areas and 15 state courts including heavily litigated venues of New York, Los Angeles, and Houston. Lex Machina allows law firms and companies to anticipate the behaviors and outcomes that different legal strategies will produce, enabling them to win cases and close business.

Lex Machina was named “Best Decision Management Solution” (AI Breakthrough Awards, 2019) and “Disruptor of the Year” (Changing Lawyer Awards, 2019). Based in Silicon Valley, Lex Machina is part of LexisNexis, a leading global provider of legal, regulatory, and business information and analytics. For more information, please visit www.lexmachina.com.

 

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