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Law industry in Singapore goes high tech
While Fintech is the buzzword going around these days, hailed for its ability to bring innovation to a staid financial industry, it is by no means the sole exemplar of disruption to a particular professional sector.
The legal industry, for instance, has long been regarded as an area where technological applications were not considered to be a huge game-changer in the bigger scheme of things. In the past, any perceived value-add was considered either minimal at best, or not robust enough to properly address the subtleties of the practice of law. And to be fair, for a period of time, there was definitely a strong argument for this case.
Technology 2.0
But times have changed, and so has the level of sophistication that comes with the latest technological advancements.
So whether it is a new-found method of breaking down complex legal processes into smaller parts to enable automation, or perhaps turning unstructured text contained within law cases into a structured data format to facilitate research, Legaltech certainly seems to have finally gotten a foothold within the industry, and the ever-increasing number of ways that technology can be used to enhance the status quo has contributed greatly to Legaltech’s rise over the last 5 to 6 years.
Flying the torch for Legal Industry
The law community here in Singapore has been busy making strides of its own to foster the adoption of Legaltech amongst the local law firms; both from an organisational as well as individual basis.
With firm support from the government, crystallised in the form of financial support programmes, measures have recently been put in place to spur the usage of technology by law firms to enhance the various facets of productivity, efficiency and overall capability.
A good case in point is that on 1st March 2017, the Ministry of Law, together with the Law Society of Singapore and SPRING Singapore, launched a new scheme dubbed ‘Tech Start for Law’.
With this scheme, Singapore law firms can simply apply for financial support from SPRING Singapore via the Law Society, which then helps to subsidise part of the initial costs that a firm will have to pay when using a certain form of legal technology and/or business development solution.
Zuu Online and LegisComm
Source: Asia Law Network
ZUU Online and our partner, LegisComm – a marketing firm that focuses on the legal sector and other related professional services, took part in the Legal Technology Roadshow organized by the Law Society of Singapore at NTUC Business Centre on 27th and 28th of March 2017. Over the two-day roadshow, various products and services were offered by legal technology providers to the members of the legal community.
The team members from both ZUU and LegisComm were there to advocate the use of content marketing as the best long-term strategy for law firms. The team was also there to promote the upcoming launch of the new ZUU Online Legal -Section on 19 April 2017. This new Legal section would also be one of the avenues where law-related content would reach a wider audience including readers from business and finance sectors.
Relevant and well-written content can result in heightened interest in a particular type of legal work, and translates into a more efficient and elegant manner of client acquisition, and even enhance customer retention.
“Content Marketing is a strategy that is value-for-money, as any content generated can be published on several platforms not only on your company’s website, it can be blasted out in the form of newsletters and reposted on your social media pages to get maximum mileage. Most importantly, any content published on the internet is evergreen and stays online for almost eternity, unless taken down” shared Eliza Tan, Managing Director of LegisComm in her speech on “Content Marketing – The best long-term strategy for Law Firms”.
Legaltech on the rise in Singapore
Source: Asia Law Network
Aside from ZUU and LegisComm, there were also interesting startups such as Asia Law Network, an online platform that connects lawyers, law firms, and clients to one another, as well as Intelllex, a portal that helps lawyers to search through case files in a faster manner, keep notes and better organise their research as a whole.
Another boost for the Singapore legal sector
During the Roadshow, the Law Society also officially launched the ‘SmartLaw Assist’ scheme. This scheme enables each law firm to get access to a subsidy amounting to 70% of the first year’s subscription costs of an online knowledge database from Singapore Academy of Law, Lexis Nexis or Thomson Reuters. The Law Society are currently accepting applications from now until 30th June 2017.
What all this boils down to is that the future is definitely looking bright for the legal sector here, what with the positive stance of promoting added usage of technology to enhance the legal services here. Hopefully, all stakeholders, be it law firms or the clients who need their services, will all benefit as a whole.
(By ZUUonlineSG)
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