As e-discovery firms automate and simplify the review process, many seek to leverage their technology for everything from information governance to financial auditing.
In the not too distant past, document review was a clunky, arduous process. While e-discovery let attorneys reach deeper into digital footprints, gathering, culling and reviewing data was rarely easy. But with the growing focus on seamless user experience, the advent of technology-assisted review (TAR), and advancements in e-discovery’s processing speed and search, this once painful process evolved to the point where it could be shrunk down to an automated “drop and drag” function.
Discovery automation firm Logikcull was at the forefront of this movement. And now the company is seeking to lead the way to the next e-discovery evolution: freeing the technology from its litigation ties. Logikcull, for example, recently launched a multitiered administration feature called “sub accounts,” which allows different groups or departments in an industry to take advantage of its document review automation tool.
Andy Wilson, CEO of Logikcull, said the company “created sub accounts because, within an organization, different departments typically use Logikcull in different ways for different purposes. Whereas traditional e-discovery platforms are generally used solely for e-discovery, organizations use Logikcull for several different use cases that require automated processing, searching, reviewing and sharing of data.”
“It might be the case that they are using Logikcull in the litigation department to do e-discovery,” he added, “while their compliance team is using it to conduct internal investigations and their account team is using it to perform tax audits.”
Logikcull calls this expanded automated review ability “legal intelligence,” which it believes shows the wide scope of what its technology can do, Wilson said.
The company’s pivot to legal intelligence is backed by legal tech industry investors. Opentext, which recently acquired e-discovery and analytics company Recommind, led a round of Series A funding worth $10 million for the company, with participation from Logikcull’s existing investor Storm Ventures. Wilson noted that the funding will be used to build out Logikcull’s engineering team and further develop its product toward offering legal intelligence to its clients.
Lokgicull, however, is not the only company finding support expanding e-discovery automation beyond litigation. Earlier this year e-discovery firm CS Disco announced $18.75 million in Series C funding from longtime investors Bessemer Venture Partners and LiveOak Venture Partners to fund the expansion of its automated e-discovery platform DISCO.
Neil Etheridge, vice president of marketing at CS Disco, noted that the funding will allow the company “to begin investment into other areas or other use cases beyond e-discovery that we want DISCO to be at the front [of]. [It will] allow us to begin working on other applications and other modules that will make up the next generation of legal technology platforms above and beyond e-discovery.”