Following on from the launch of its multi-faceted Lexis+ AI platform of genAI capabilities, LexisNexis is now going to do the same for tax professionals – which covers lawyers and accountants – with a dedicated Tolley+ AI system that taps the organisation’s extensive libraries of tax information.
Tolley+ AI will feature conversational search, ‘insightful summarisation’, intelligent drafting and document upload capabilities, all supported by state-of-the-art encryption and privacy technology. Results will ‘always be backed by a verifiable, citable authority or source allowing users to check the validity of results instantly’ the group added
They noted that the same genAI tech backbone from Lexis+ AI is being used here and that to address any accuracy concerns they stressed that they are ‘leveraging the global expertise and experience of over 2,000 technologists, data scientists and subject matter experts to develop, test and validate an AI solution specifically for the UK tax industry’.
In terms of roll-out, the product – which is still going through development – will be available initially to members of their new ‘Tolley+ AI Insider Program’, an initiative that includes educational input.
As readers will know, Tolley has long been the brand name under which LexisNexis offers tax-focused products. The group is also not a stranger to AI and automation, in fact in 2018 Artificial Lawyer did an article on its Tolley.AI bot that could answer key questions on tax issues – see here.
Gerry Duffy, Managing Director at LexisNexis UK, said: ‘By combining our advanced technological capabilities with outstanding Tolley tax research and guidance content, we will be able to help our customers accelerate their workflows, increase productivity and gain a clear competitive advantage.’
While, Jon Scriven, Director of Tax Markets at Tolley, added: ‘AI is set to transform and revolutionise the practice of tax and it is clear that tax professionals are keen to embrace the value that generative AI can offer.’
So, there you go. It makes total sense that genAI moves into tax information as well as legal. In terms of its impact, perhaps one key aspect that relates back to the legal sector more broadly is that as the use of this technology becomes more widespread, any remaining barriers to its adoption fall away.
If your accountant is using genAI tools, and then inside corporates the same happens with the HR department, and the sales teams, and finance, and in fact every other department in the business, then using genAI tools for inhouse legal becomes in effect ‘expected’, and then in turn it becomes expected for external advisers as well.
The same happened with the first big wave of digitisation in the 1980s/1990s with the combined impact of the Microsoft/word processing and internet revolution. To not embrace this technology made you harder to engage with as you would be slower and operating with a different work pattern.
Any road, there is a very long way to go before productivity improvements from genAI follow through into systemic change, but this is yet another sign of the reshaping that is coming.