At the end of 2020, EXE.legal, a Lithuania-based specialized law boutique, and InvestCEE LegalTech Consultancy, a legal innovation advisor, have announced their cooperation agreement on consultancy services aimed at law firms and in-house legal departments with a focus on deploying legal technology solutions. Since then, the collaboration has kicked off with full speed, Dr. Paulius Astromskis, Managing Partner at EXE.legal, and Dr. Orsolya Szabó, CEO of InvestCEE LegalTech Consultancy, shared their take-aways from the past few months.
Providing LegalTech consulting for law firms is an integral part of the InvestCEE’s service offering. We collaborate closely with the legal and business teams at law firms of all sizes in order to help them optimize internal workstreams while also offering tech-assisted services to their corporate clients. This interview was prepared in collaboration with EXE.legal to inspire legal and business teams to combine traditional legal services with smart technology solutions.
What steps of the collaboration between EXE.legal and InvestCEE have already been implemented?
Paulius Astromskis: Signing the cooperation agreement was the first of many pre-set milestones and, as previously announced, it has been achieved already and is the result of lengthy discussions and brainstorming on what can be achieved through this cooperation. This process also allowed us to know each other better and build the environment of trust in each other.
Orsolya Szabó: Indeed, getting the cooperation agreement in place was a major first step – and we have been moving forward since. Given EXE.legal and InvestCEE joined forces to cover both internal process optimization for EXE.legal’s law firm environment and client-facing (external) services, the collaboration happens on various workstreams. EXE.legal just moved beyond the pilot project phase with a document automation tool sourced via InvestCEE and the team is now working on rolling out the solution also for EXE.legal’s clients to take their operations to the whole new level.
What key take-aways do you have from this collaboration since it kicked off? What value has it already created?
Orsolya Szabó: For InvestCEE’S ecosystem business model – which connects stakeholders in law, business and technology – the collaboration with EXE.legal reaffirms the role we play in bridging the gap between legal clients (law firms and in-house legal teams) and legaltech vendors. We really enjoy helping our clients explore new opportunities that technology opens up for their legal services — and tuning in to legal innovation in the Baltics is a unique opportunity. While there is immediate value in digitizing legal service delivery in the current circumstances (shaped by the pandemic), there is plenty of long-term value to be created if we successfully align legal solutions with a digital economy that is unfolding as we speak.
Paulius Astromskis: I can second that: InvestCEE has helped us to choose document automation services provider, allowing us to experience their wisdom, knowledge and understanding of legal tech market and the real value of their marketplace services – so we are able to see both immediate benefits and the potential for further improvements that keep on unfolding during this cooperation.
Why, in your opinion, is this collaboration important? And what can it bring to the table for other clients from both of the companies?
Paulius Astromskis: Our strategic focus is on Law & Tech industry, which is a combination of two related, but at the same time – independent – sides. On one hand, we are advising on various Technology Law issues, but on the other hand – we are also developing the branch of Legal Technologies services, which is a combination of consultancy, marketplace, research & development activities. Within this context we see partnership with InvestCEE as a key practical cooperation, which allows Lithuanian businesses to access their LegalTech Marketplace and use the great deal of experience and wisdom they have developed. So we see InvestCEE as a “big brother” in this context, with promising and far reaching opportunity within the Legal Tech stream of our services, which will then allow us to share our experience with other clients and partners.
Orsolya Szabó: The partnership model we developed with EXE.legal is a great opportunity for all stakeholders to benefit from InvestCEE’s ecosystem business model. Our success is measured by our partners’ success: if we can help EXE.legal provide increasingly value-driven legal services by implementing technology solutions from our LegalTech Marketplace, it means that we also create value for the lawyers working at EXE.legal, for their clients in the Baltics, for the legaltech vendors in our network and also the legal innovation community at large. Win-win-win.
And what about the nearest plans? What’s in store for both of the companies in the next few months?
Orsolya Szabó: Since this is a multi-level cooperation, there’re a lot of short- and long-term plans around the initial work-frame of the agreement, but on the side, we are also planning to co-host webinars on legal technology and innovation topics. Stay tuned for upcoming joint events in the virtual space!
Paulius Astromskis: And besides planning various events and activities to share the best practices news in legaltech industry, we have also started building InvestCEE Lithuanian chapter in the form of special webpage and offers for local law firms and in-house legal departments – so our experience-sharing journey has already begun!
With this experience interview, we invite law firm leaders to join our discussion on smarter business of law strategy. It’s time to combine intelligent technology with the law firms’ ability to adapt to a digital economy and evolving business standards and processes. Reach out to us for a tour of our smart technology solutions or a free brainstorming session!
