Lander & Rogers has announced the new cohort of tech startups for its 2024 LawTech Hub incubator: Ask Lexi, Mary Technology, and Vici by OCRT Consulting.
Artificial Lawyer has been following what must now be the most established legal tech incubator in the Southern Hemisphere since 2019. This year, the Australia-based LawTech Hub is focused especially on AI – which is understandable – and is aligned with the firm’s AI Lab, which was launched in February.
This latest cohort was chosen from a record intake of applications, which is interesting given that Slaughter and May’s Collaborate also recently reported the highest-ever number of applications for its cohort in the UK. This suggests a growing number of young companies in the sector globally.
This site’s prognosis is that the availability of generativeAI backbones upon which to build new applications has been at least part of the reason for this new wave of legal tech startups. I.e. a lot of the core product work has been done already e.g. an LLM, leaving the startup team to build upon that to create specialised offerings where a lot of the value will be wrapped up in the UI/UX, hopefully smooth workflows, interoperability with common platforms, and sometimes perhaps even just getting brand buy-in in a market once again swelling with new companies.
It certainly feels the most vibrant it’s been for a while for legal tech startups.
So, let’s have a look at the 2024 cohort:
Sydney-based Lext is the team behind Ask Lexi – it has a suite of legal productivity tools powered by large language models that help lawyers get from blank page to first draft faster than ever in four key areas: legal research, document review, legal drafting, and dataset review.
The team at Lext said: ‘We’d like to achieve a pilot and more detailed feedback from specialist lawyers at Lander & Rogers and we’d love to explore use cases for our infrastructure with the firm, and if the need is there, their clients.’
Mary Technology, also based in Sydney, harnesses AI to help law firms automate and improve the process of drafting chronologies — one of the most important, time-consuming tasks at the beginning of every matter. Mary ingests vast amounts of client documentation and creates dynamic, fully formatted chronologies that lawyers can interact with to quickly comprehend matters and collaborate with colleagues.
On working with Lander & Rogers through the LawTech Hub, the team at Mary Technology said: ‘It gives our product the opportunity to be refined alongside one of the top Australian law firms, which will provide us with key insights and feedback to drive our product forward.’
Vici by OCRT Consulting, which straddles Brisbane and Canberra, augments experts with an AI analytics tool that disrupts traditional investigation methods. Leveraging breakthrough AI, Vici rapidly interrogates datasets to find relevant facts via interactive visualisations. In essence, it illuminates easily obfuscated information.
Team Vici (part of which is pictured above) said of their participation in the 2024 LawTech Hub: ‘We recognised the vital need for collaboration with experts intimately acquainted with the industry’s intricacies and pain points. Participating in Lander & Roger’s LawTech Hub represents the ideal catalyst to evolve Vici from a sophisticated prototype to a widely adopted legal discovery solution fulfilling thus-far unmet efficiency needs. Their guidance is critical to our legal pivot after serving the public sector.’
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The selected startups will embark on a six-month equity-free journey, ‘refining their concepts and collaborating closely with Lander & Rogers’ legal and tech experts’ the firm said. The programme culminates in a competitive global pitch night.
Genevieve Collins, chief executive partner at Lander & Rogers, commented: ‘Our 2024 LawTech Hub, running in tandem with our AI Lab, is a testament to our commitment in leading the innovation charge in Australia and supporting the legal tech ecosystem.
‘Several platforms that have come out of the LawTech Hub have been integrated into the firm to enhance efficiency and better serve our clients. Many of our alumni have also gone on to be adopted by law firms all over the world. We look forward to seeing how cohort seven impacts the industry.’
Courtney Blackman (above), Director of the LawTech Hub, concluded: ‘The calibre of applicants this year was exceptional. Ask Lexi, Mary Technology, and Vici stood out for their AI-driven approaches to solving complex legal challenges. We’re looking forward to working with the new cohort over the coming months and pushing the technological boundaries of the legal industry even further.’
And if you found this interesting, then check out this…
Legal Innovators California, the landmark legal tech conference in San Francisco on June 4 and 5, brings together private practice and in-house professionals who are actively shaping the legal innovation landscape.
This year, we are introducing a new aspect to the two-day program: the Start-Up Gallery. This initiative provides early-stage startups with a platform to set out what their product can do and what their vision is, in front of an audience that is eager to hear about the latest innovations and approaches to solving the legal sector’s most important challenges.
Also in attendance will be three renowned tech investment experts:
- Cary Burch, Founding Partner, President and CEO, Bryce Catalyst
- Gabriela Isturiz, General Partner, The Fund XX
- And, Zach Abramowitz, legal tech investor and advisor, Killer Whale Strategies.
If your startup would like to know more and take part, then please contact, Craig: craig@cosmonauts.biz
And to secure your seat at the conference as a whole, then please see Tickets here.
For more information about the two-day conference in San Francisco, June 4 and 5, such as who else will be speaking and the agenda, then please see here.
