Legal professionals gathered in New York on Monday for the first day of ALM's Legalweek conference, where there was a session on evaluating AI vendors and the criteria that matter most to law firms and corporate legal departments.
Jeff Reihl, the chief technology officer of LexisNexis, moderated the panel session.
There's a lot of hype surrounding AI tools, and legal teams go to extraordinary lengths to sort through marketing buzzwords to find the real business tasks that these solutions can solve.
"It's not about the vendor," Jim Merrifield, the director of information for governance and business intake at Robinson & Cole LLP, said during the panel. "It's about your organization's problems that you're trying to solve."
Merrifield said Robinson & Cole conducts internal conversations with its AI committee and practice groups to understand pressing needs before picking vendors.
There are dozens of AI legal vendors, including established players and startups. Marc Mandel, the general counsel for Exos, said during the panel that some of the most interesting innovations can come from startups.
Similar to legal teams, investors of AI tech also have their criteria for picking which tools to back. Brandon Gleklen, an investor with Battery Ventures, said during the panel that his firm evaluates vendors based on how fast they are adapting to the changing market.
One criterion that matters most to legal teams is security. Merrifield said his firm carefully evaluates each potential tool. That includes reviewing each vendor's SOC 2 certification, a security compliance standard that accredits a vendor's security abilities.
Marina Kaganovich, an executive trust lead at Google Cloud, said that teams should conduct a holistic assessment of what the AI will be used for, including an internal evaluation of how the AI tool will impact infrastructure and data.
Gleklen said teams should ask if the tool actually solves a core business problem or if the tool is just something that looks nice.
Signing a new contract with an AI vendor is just the beginning, as legal teams take more steps to ensure the new tool is successful for the organization.
Merrifield said he views AI vendors as business partners who should be in meetings with you and should be embedded into the rollout process of the tool. He also recommends that firms don't buy too many tools at once to maximize the impact of the implementation.
"Don't rush the rollout," Mandel added.
After signing the contract with the vendor, Mandel said, the focus shifts to postsales support. This includes working with the vendor to meet the ongoing needs of the legal team, especially in cases of adopting AI tools.
"In this AI world, the winners will be the adopters," Gleklen said.
Finally, how do legal teams measure the success of the new AI tools? Merrifield said the tool must either generate revenue or help you cut down on costs, otherwise the return on investment is not hitting the mark.
Mandel said the best AI tools allow his team to be more efficient in their daily work so they can have more time for long-term projects.
--Editing by Nicole Bleier.
Law360 is owned by LexisNexis Legal & Professional, a RELX Group company.
For a reprint of this article, please contact reprints@law360.com.
