Slaughter and May announces third Collaborate Cohort
The 2022 programme will see the firm pilot all four legal tech companies in the cohort.
International law firm Slaughter and May today announces the successful legal tech companies selected to form the third cohort of the firm’s legal tech programme, Slaughter and May Collaborate.
Launched in 2019, Collaborate aims to help shape the development of new legal tech and identify and harness future efficiencies in the delivery of legal services. The programme sets out to find the best legal tech companies in the market, helping them to test and develop their products alongside Slaughter and May lawyers, clients, and legal tech and innovation specialists.
As part of a refreshed offering for 2022, all cohort members will be given the opportunity to undertake a pilot of their product. To date, Slaughter and May has supported 17 legal tech companies via the Collaborate programme, going on to continue working with or purchase licenses of four of the alumni.
When applications to join the programme opened in late 2021, applicants were asked to respond to specific problem statements describing challenges faced by members of the firm. These problem statements focussed on areas such as knowledge management, on the job learning in a hybrid world and tracking responses to Requests for Information from regulators.
The four businesses, selected by the Collaborate team, with input from the firm’s Client Innovation and Collaborate Advisory Networks were chosen from a diverse pool of technology solutions. The successful companies that will make up the Collaborate cohort for 2022 are:
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A knowledge and drafting platform allowing lawyers to search, discover and analyse precedent clauses across a secure single platform and to quickly draft and review legal contracts. The platform helps to automatically organise and surface knowledge content in partnership with the firm’s Knowledge Management team. DraftWise will work with us to enable users to easily surface precedent clauses (from our internal Knowledge Management system) whilst drafting. |
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A knowledge management tool which pinpoints relevant information from across a firm, without interrupting workflow. Among other functions, Syntheia allows users to efficiently manage, share and apply knowledge when drafting legal documents. Syntheia will work with us to enable users to easily surface precedent clauses (from our internal Knowledge Management system) whilst drafting. |
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An intuitive platform for document, data and task management. Ruby Datum allows for collaboration across organisations, creating a user experience that is both secure and easy to use. We will work with Ruby Datum to address the challenge around managing multiple Requests for Information from regulators. |
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A digital meeting solution that transforms Microsoft Teams into a multi-dimensional platform for hybrid, co-located and distributed working. Laduma uses immersive interactive displays and integrated multi-device sharing capabilities to put people at the heart of the meeting experience. This responds to the challenge of supporting on the job learning experiences for our people working in remote and hybrid environments. Laduma will give these colleagues a voice that can be heard in meetings. It will empower them to communicate, collaborate, present and share their learning experiences with colleagues as if they were in the same room. |
In addition to the opportunity to undertake a pilot of their product, cohort members will also receive guidance, advice and mentoring from the firm’s Knowledge and Innovation Team and practice groups. The cohort will also have the option to pitch to Slaughter and May partners for equity investment, via the Slaughter and May Ventures platform.
Chris McGaffin, Collaborate Sponsoring Partner, said, “Yet again, the quality of applications received for the programme this year was fantastic. It was a tough choice, but these four legal tech companies offer something unique and valuable for our people. We are really looking forward to working with the cohort to test their products in response to the challenges put forward.”
Jane Edwarde, Collaborate Sponsoring Partner added, “The changes we’ve introduced as part of Collaborate 2022 offer us the opportunity to work even more closely with our cohort. We are really excited to pilot all four technologies through the programme, offering our lawyers the opportunity to test and feedback on the products, helping with development whilst generating valuable ideas that can further fuel legal innovation.”
Jane Stewart, Head of Knowledge and Innovation at Slaughter and May said: “We are proud and excited that Collaborate has continuously evolved to match our business’ needs and a rapidly evolving legal tech market. We regularly pilot legal tech tools - but Collaborate offers us the opportunity to get really close to pioneering legal tech companies that offer solutions to challenges our lawyers are facing day to day.”
James Ding, CEO of DraftWise said: "Since starting in the UK, we've heard about Slaughter and May's excellent approach to creating and using knowledge with their lawyers. Participating in Collaborate allows us to learn alongside truly great partners and to continue developing our tools to help lawyers with their drafting and negotiation needs."
Horace Wu, Founder of Syntheia said: "We are delighted to join Slaughter and May's Collaborate programme! As an Australian start up, we are very excited to work with one of the world's leading firms and expand our presence in the UK. We are looking forward to putting our software into the hands of the Slaughter and May team, and exploring the ways we can help them tap into their documents and data."
Nick Watson, CEO and Founder of Ruby Datum said: "We have always said 2022 will be an exciting year of collaboration for us, and what better way to move forward with this intent than through Slaughter and May's prestigious Collaborate programme. The team at Ruby Datum could not be more excited about the problem statement presented to us, and ideas are already flowing with what can be achieved. Initial conversations with the Collaborate team have us incredibly excited, collaboration benefits everyone."
Martin Prendergast, CEO of Laduma said: “It is a privilege to be working with Slaughter and May as a part of their 2022 Collaborate programme. We are excited to be bringing our technology to such a prestigious organisation. Training is critical – especially so in the legal sector. Yet continued restrictions on the amount of time we get to spend face-to-face inevitably has an impact on the ability to deliver quality training and informal mentorship. Our technology bridges the gap between distributed, remote and in-office workers - offering more dynamic, human interactions that are the next best thing to being face-to-face.”
Note for editors:
The 2022 Collaborate problem statements:
- We are seeking to harness the power of new technologies to enhance our Knowledge Management documents and processes, in particular the ability to easily surface precedent clauses (from our internal KM system) whilst drafting.
- Manually reviewing legal agreements to check whether they have been properly executed is a time-consuming and repetitive task. We are seeking a tool which can check whether a document has been validly signed by the correct parties to reduce the time our lawyers need to spend on this.
- Law firms have historically relied on physical proximity to encourage learning. Our L&D and Innovation teams are working on a project to help support on the job learning experience for our people in a remote/hybrid environment, and would welcome tech solutions which might address this.
- It is often difficult to collect and track large volumes of data, documents and communications from clients submitted in response to Requests for Information from regulators, in various areas of our practice. We would welcome a tech solution to assist with this.
- Open category: if you think you have a legal tech solution that could assist our business in another way, we’d love to hear from you.
About Collaborate
Launched in 2019, Slaughter and May Collaborate aims to help shape the development of new legal tech and identify and harness future efficiencies in the delivery of legal services. The programme sets out to find the best legal tech companies in the market, helping them to test and develop their products alongside Slaughter and May lawyers, clients, and legal tech and innovation specialists.
This year’s cohort was also shaped with valuable input from Slaughter and May’s Client Innovation Network and Collaborate Advisory Network. Our Client Innovation Network is a forum for legal teams from some of our client organisations to discuss innovation and technology, whilst our Collaborate Advisory Network is made up of representatives from our relationship firms, who are interested in all things innovation and legal tech. Both groups were offered the opportunity to provide input on our selection process, and will be invited to participate in the next stages of the programme, giving cohort members the opportunity to engage both with in-house legal teams and innovation experts from across the globe.
Collaborate 2022 will again be led by Slaughter and May partners Jane Edwarde and Chris McGaffin, supported by the firm’s central Knowledge and Innovation team; Jane Stewart (Head of Knowledge and Innovation), Emily Lew (Senior Knowledge and Innovation Manager), Billie Moore (Knowledge and Innovation Manager and Programme Lead) and Peter Morton (Legal Operations Executive and Programme Support), all of whom have played a key role in the development of the programme.