TechTorget, Oslo

This month saw the inaugural launch of TechTorget in Oslo. The event was brought together by Peter van Dam, Chief Digital Officer at Simonsen Vogt Wiig, and Erik Ødegaard, with the full support and collaboration of the Norwegian Bar Association. 

The event aims to provide the legal sector with an overview of legal tech solutions that are proven and available to legal practitioners to implement right now.

“We saw the legal sector and vendors using enormous amounts of time to meet each other. So we created a sort of marketplace for them.”  

Photo of TechTorget event in Oslo
TechTorget’s inaugural event in Oslo

Spending just 2-3 hours at the event, says van Dam, can help lawyers to stay informed on the many vendors they would otherwise be unaware of in the market who are providing some great solutions.  

What’s more, the event makes future legal tech concrete. It can really demonstrate how, through small steps and investing in real solutions, the legal industry has nothing to fear as it prepares for that future. 

QV Forum 2019

Nordic Legal Tech telling it like it is!

The 10th and final QV Forum was held in Stockholm this year. Its central theme was Law 2.0 – an exploration of the potential disruption of the legal market. 

Nordic Legal Tech was there, with a provocative presentation, “Software Is Eating the World”. CEO Nicholas Hawtin warned:

“The next generation of solution builders are focused on users and their problems. The solutions they are building are built on solving the user’s problems as intuitively and simply as possible. They are focused on the task the user is trying to perform, not on the legal issue related to that task. The resulting solutions integrate seamlessly and are often invisible.

“This may sound straightforward, but it is very hard to do – and it is not something law firms do well. Their processes do not support it. Their business model directly hinders it. Eventually, their inability to master it will cost them lots of jobs and massive revenue. And ‘eventually’ is coming faster than many of them understand.”

“Software is Eating the World.”

London Calling – LegalGeek 2019

Nordic Legal Tech couldn’t make LegalGeek London this year but we have one of our trusty members reporting on this increasingly important event. Torsten Torpe, head of Legal Tech Innovation at Bech-Bruun, gives us a run down of Bech-Bruun’s presentation at the conference and some comments on the gig generally.

Photo of Torsten Torpe speaking at LegalGeek London 2019
Torsten Torpe speaking at LegalGeek 2019, London

Discussing best practice for AI adoption at LegalGeek

At this year’s LegalGeek conference, we were invited by Luminance (an AI software provider) to talk about how you actually get started using Artificial Intelligence. Being among the early adopting law firms of AI, we were asked to share our experience and pinpoint the dos and don’ts. 

Although vendors and technologists often tend to claim the opposite, getting started with AI and technology in general isn’t easy. Our vast experience shows that it requires a strong buy-in from the top management. A point that is as surprising as it is constructive. We discussed what strong management buy-in means in Bech-Bruun and how we have succeeded in establishing a legal tech innovation unit with direct report to the top management.

A New Collaboration Between Nordic Legal Tech Members

Dansk Advokater and Schultz Legal join forces

The business association for Danish law firms, Danske Advokater, and Danish law firm, Schultz Legal, have come together to provide a new platform for lawyers to access and search for legal information. The new product will compete with the only service currently on the market and offered by Karnov.

The partners expect to launch their product in September 2020 and are hoping the collaboration will ensure competition in the legal information search market.

Read the press release here (in Danish).