While there has been an abundance of innovative legal tech products flooding the market over recent years, not every fresh out of the box product achieves enduring success. Some fail quietly, while others go out with more of a tumult. This piece revisits five of the most memorable legal tech failures in the last decade.
The first is Atrium. Launched in 2017, Atrium was a much anticipated project that sought to transform legal services through its dual-entity model of a law firm combined with a technology company. Established by Silicon Valley prodigy, Justin Kan, who previously sold Twitch to Amazon for $970 million, excitement was high and funding bountiful. Unfortunately, within three years, despite multiple attempts to pivot its business model, Atrium was forced to shut down. Further details can be found here.
The next on this list is QuickLegal. The service provided on-demand legal advice to consumers and a cloud practice management platform for lawyers. Under the leadership of legal tech entrepreneur Derek Bluford, QuickLegal’s sudden decline followed revelations of fraudulent activity resulting in the firm quickly shutting down. More information about Bluford and QuickLegal can be found here.
ROSS Intelligence, an early mover in the application of artificial intelligence to legal research, also features on this list. Despite notable successes and accolades, a lawsuit filed by Thomson Reuters accusing ROSS of surreptitiously stealing content from Westlaw, ultimately led to the demise of the company in 2020. Find more about the ROSS journey here.
On the fourth spot is LexisNexis’s attempt to break into the cloud-based law practice management space with Firm Manager. Despite a major revamp to overcome early press issues, it could not gain enough traction in the increasingly crowded market, and the curtain was drawn on Firm Manager in 2017. More on this can be read here.
Lastly, Gavelytics, a leading litigation analytics company, surprised the industry with its abrupt shutdown in 2022. However, there was a silver lining. Soon after the closure, another startup, Pre/Dicta, acquired the Gavelytics platform alongside its wealth of court data. Details on this are provided here.
All these examples underline that while the legal tech industry continues to mature and expand, not every new venture will be crowned with success. However, even in failure, there are lessons to be learned and, occasionally, the possibility of a phoenix rising from the ashes. More comprehensive insights on these legal tech failures can be accessed here.