AI For Lawyers and How it Affects the Future of the Law Industry

What Type of AI Are We Talking About?

AI is the intelligence of computers that are programmed to mimic humans. But unlike humans, they can process massive amounts of data in as little as a few seconds. This makes AI so useful for industries that manage and digest much information, including law firms.

Machine Learning

At the core of artificial intelligence, machine learning equips software with an intuitive grasp of data. Machine learning algorithms slowly become better and more accurate over time; they are self-learning algorithms.

Natural Language Processing

Natural language processing (NLP) allows computers to understand, interpret, and generate human language. In the legal domain, NLP can be a powerful tool for analyzing legal documents, contracts, and legislation with the help of human input and supervision.

What Can AI Do For The Legal Industry?

AI has the potential to revolutionize how law firms work. More specifically, it can streamline numerous processes, including:

Discovery

During the discovery process, lawyers and paralegals often have to review thousands of documents to find evidence relevant to the case. Legal document automation makes this process more straightforward due to its ability to simultaneously process vast amounts of information.

AI discovery software enables attorneys to sift through documents by employing search terms or particular criteria, like dates or geographic locations. In contrast, lawyers without AI would have to spend weeks on this.

Generative artificial intelligence is another highly beneficial AI tool for the discovery process. Through sophisticated algorithms, generative AI can comb through extensive datasets, pinpoint relevant information, and draft discovery responses and requests.

Legal Research

Legal research is a time-intensive task that requires sifting through countless legal documents, statutes, and case law to find precedents relevant to the case. AI-powered legal research tools are changing this landscape by processing and analyzing vast quantities of legal texts in a fraction of the time.

Aside from searching for keywords, legal AI can understand the context, interpret the semantics of legal language, and draw connections between legal precedents and current cases.

Due Diligence

Due diligence is a critical component of legal work. This is especially true in significant transactions like mergers and acquisitions, where understanding entities’ legal and financial health is paramount. Without AI, due diligence is a labor-intensive process that requires weeks or even months of rigorous examination of documents to identify liabilities, compliance issues, and other potential risks.

Legal AI streamlines this process through its ability to rapidly analyze large volumes of data, identifying anomalies, patterns, and risks that would take humans considerably longer to uncover.

Contract Review and Analysis

Some AI tools are capable of examining contracts in detail at faster speeds. These AI-driven tools can identify clauses that deviate from standard language, assess risk levels, and suggest modifications based on prevailing laws and legal standards.

This specific function of AI speeds up the contract review process, enhances the accuracy and consistency of contracts, and minimizes the risk of disputes and litigation,

What Are The Benefits of AI For Legal Professionals?

The integration of AI makes perfect sense for any law firm that wants to optimize its processes. Here’s an expanded look at the key benefits AI brings to the table for the legal profession:

Efficiency

Document sorting, evidence review, and even certain aspects of legal research can now be handled by AI tools, letting legal professionals allocate their time to more substantial legal work.

For instance, AI-enabled document review tools can analyze thousands of documents in the time it takes a human to go through a handful, drastically reducing the lead time on cases and allowing lawyers to easily meet tight deadlines.

Accuracy

One of the standout features of AI is its ability to minimize errors in tasks that involve data processing and analysis. This means more accurate document review, fewer research oversights, and better risk assessment.

Legal AI tools are designed to recognize patterns and anomalies consistently that surpass human capability, which is particularly valuable in identifying relevant case law, precedents, and statutory requirements.

Cost Reduction

The economic impact of AI on legal practices is significant. Through automation, AI reduces the hours lawyers and paralegals need to spend drafting.

Plus, the time savings may allow law firms to eliminate redundant roles or reduce the staff they need for routine tasks, which is another massive aspect.

How Can AI Benefit Law Firm Clients?

Legal AI tools help create more efficient workflows in law firms, but they can also have direct benefits to clients, including:

• Speed: The streamlined efficiency of AI leads to quicker turnaround times, meaning clients see faster outcomes and resolutions.
• Reduced Costs: Savings realized from AI’s operational improvements reduce hourly costs.
• Strategy: AI’s precision and advanced analytics support having more accurate and strategically sound legal approaches.

Legal Document Automation

The discovery phase of litigation is often the most time-consuming and has much room for error. Briefpoint recognized this long-standing issue and designed an AI tool to eliminate that bottleneck.

Briefpoint automates the preparation of discovery request and discovery response documents, including but not limited to:

• Requests for Admission
• Requests for Production
• Interrogatories

Plus, the process is simple: you upload the discovery request, add objections and responses to your discovery response, and then download the document in Word to finish it up. It’s easy, straightforward, and takes hours off the usual process.

How Briefpoint Helps You Save

Discovery responses cost firms $23,240, per year, per attorney. $23,240 estimate assumes an associate attorney salary of $150,000 (including benefits – or $83 an hour), 20 cases per year/per associate, 4 discovery sets per case, 30 questions per set, 3.5 hours spent responding to each set, and 1800 hours of billable hours per year.

Under these assumptions, you save $20,477 using Briefpoint, per year, per attorney.

Test Briefpoint yourself by scheduling a demo here.

Is AI An Advantage?

AI is continuously evolving, which can only mean more opportunities to come for tomorrow’s legal industry. If you’re on the fence about using AI for your law firm, there’s no need to fully integrate AI right away. Instead, you can start small by optimizing one aspect of your legal research process: discovery.

Briefpoint is a bespoke tool committed to harnessing the power of AI to transform legal services, making them more efficient, accurate, and accessible. For legal professionals, embracing AI is not just about staying ahead in a competitive landscape; it’s about redefining the very essence of legal practice for the better.