Freshfields Signs New Multi-Year Deal with Kira Systems

Some more good news for legal AI pioneer, Kira Systems: global law firm Freshfields has signed a new multi-year contract with the machine learning/NLP company, as part of the firm’s ‘on-going commitment to innovation and embedding legal technology’.

Now, you might say, so what? But, the reality is keeping in with a major client like Freshfields is significant, even more so when one considers that the law firm handles oodles of M&A deals that need AI-led doc review, as well as other review work in other practice areas.

From feedback Artificial Lawyer has heard, not every law firm that signs up to an AI system keeps using it. In fact, some barely get beyond a pilot in terms of actually using it for paid client work.

So, this is heartening in two ways: first, it shows that major law firms really are exploiting AI tech for client work – as why otherwise sign a multi-year deal with Kira; and secondly; it shows that AI systems are seeing longer term relationships evolve out of what were the heady and often hyped up days of 2015 to 2017. 

In short, this is great news for Kira, but also good news for the legal AI market as a whole.

The company went on to say in a statement that ‘since assessing Kira back in 2015, Freshfields has come to see the software as a key part of the firm’s technology-enhanced client service delivery model…A wide variety of projects have been run through Kira, covering M&A, regulatory and compliance  matters. These have spanned across a majority of Freshfields’ global offices in New York, London, Europe through to Hong Kong’.

Kira added: ‘[By] combining Kira with other leading technology solutions including HighQ and HotDocs, the firm is able to deliver services with a high level of transparency and efficiency.’

The Kira implementation programme sits within the firm’s recently created Legal Technology Operations team, led by Jamie Whalebone.

Dan Von Weihe, VP Customer Success and Sales from Kira Systems, commented: ‘We are honoured to work with Freshfields as they significantly expand their use of machine learning technology to create integrated solutions and establish new gold-standards in legal service delivery.’