Two More Legal Tech M&A Deals This Week

Two more legal tech and adjacent deals have taken place, this time SurePoint Technologies has acquired ZenCase in the practice management field; and L Suite, a legal community organisation with a focus on inhouse, has acquired Luminate+, an eLearning business for lawyers.

The deals follow other consolidation moves, including Elite buying Tranch at the start of the year. It’s not a flood of deals yet – and when all the data is in at year’s end the numbers may not be out of character for the sector – even so, it’s a quick start for legal tech and adjacent M&A.

The deals.

SurePoint Technologies is a provider of software solutions to mid-sized law firms, while ZenCase, is a developer of practice management software.

SurePoint’s acquisition completes an ‘already robust portfolio, seamlessly integrating Leopard Solutions,’ they said.

ZenCase is able to streamline workflows, centralize key information, and optimize task management, while SurePoint’s solution portfolio is offering features such as automated time management, knowledge management, document automation, and task blueprints.

With ZenCase, SurePoint now has a ‘simple, effective, and user-friendly front-end platform backed with SurePoint’s capabilities’.

In short, this is a classic 2 + 2 = 5 type deal to build a more comprehensive platform of capabilities.

Eric Thurston, CEO, SurePoint Technologies, said: ‘Our combined portfolio delivers a unified platform ushering in the next generation of legal technology. Firms that embrace these tools will gain a single partner capable of helping them navigate the demands of an evolving market and position themselves for long-term success in an increasingly competitive legal landscape.’

Meanwhile, the L Suite is a community for GCs at high-growth companies and investment funds, while Luminate+, is an eLearning platform. So, a non-tech business buying a tech-based one.

This ‘strategic move strengthens The L Suite’s commitment to supporting the legal sector by enhancing access to high-quality Continuing Legal Education (CLE) content, addressing a longstanding need for practical learning tailored for modern in-house counsel’, they said.

Greg Raiten, Co-founder of The L Suite, said: ‘The complexities of today’s legal environment demand rapid access to continuous learning and strategic insights across a broad range of topics. By integrating Luminate+’s platform with The L Suite’s robust community and industry-leading content partnerships, we’re transforming how legal professionals engage with CLE — enabling seamless access to a comprehensive library of essential knowledge aggregated from the world’s top law firms.’

The acquisition comes at a crucial time for in-house counsel, who are ‘urgently in need of relevant learning opportunities’ as they grapple with an increasingly complex web of legal and regulatory issues, they said.

And this site would add: they also face an increasingly complex set of legal tech-related challenges and opportunities related to efficiency and productivity, especially driven by the arrival of genAI.

–

As noted, a handful of deals does not an M&A avalanche make, but it will be interesting to see if this accelerates.

Either way, as the legal tech world produces many new companies, often created because of the ease of product development that genAI affords, others – not always AI-related – are merging together, creating larger businesses that in turn consolidate and concentrate their customers.