Category: Interviews Page 6 of 9

LawTech.Asia Quick Chats: Dov Greenbaum, Director of the Zvi Meitar Institute for Legal Implications of Emerging Technologies

On 8th January 2019

In Artificial Intelligence, Interviews, Legal Innovation, Legal Research

Reading time: 7 minutes

Interview by Emily Tan & Ong Chin Ngee | Edited by Irene Ng

As a visiting professor at the Singapore Management University (SMU) in 2018, Professor Dov Greenbaum taught the module “Introduction to Law and Technology”. In line with his research focus on the ethical, social, economic and legal issues in emerging technologies both in hi-tech and biotech, Prof. Greenbaum also delivered a seminar on the topic of “Legal and Ethical Considerations with the Advancement of AI and Machine Learning”. As part of his collaboration with SMU’s Centre for AI and Data Governance, Prof. Greenbaum is leading SMU students on a year-long project where students work with stakeholders of emerging technologies to develop a research paper providing actionable analysis of the technology and its implications.

#LegalHackers Profile: Eric Chin, Legal Hackers Melbourne

By Huiling Xie

On 11th December 2018

In Events, Interviews, Law Firms, Lawyers, Legal Innovation, Legal Research, People, Policy

Reading time: 5 minutes

Interview by Huiling Xie | Edited by Amelia Chew & Emily Tan

In November 2018, LawTech.Asia co-organised the inaugural APAC Legal Hackers Summit alongside Singapore Legal Hackers and the Singapore Academy of Law’s Future Law Innovation Programme (FLIP), bringing together Legal Hackers chapter organisers in the region to share insights on legal innovation across APAC. Legal Hackers is a global movement of lawyers, policymakers, designers, technologists, and academics who explore issues and opportunities where technology can improve and inform the practice of law, and where law, legal practice, and policy can adapt to rapidly changing technology. In this series, we profile Legal Hackers chapter organisers who are driving legal innovation in their cities.

Here, Eric Chin, a strategy consultant for the legal industry and chapter organiser at Legal Hackers Melbourne, shares his insights on where the legal industry is headed.

You started your career in the consulting industry, providing services to a number of professional services firms across industries such as law, engineering, and accounting. What about the legal industry drew you to carve out an independent practice specialising in consulting for law firms?

The legal market is in a very unique position in its history. I see a lot of opportunity in helping law firms, NewLaw firms and LegalTech firms navigate the changing market.

Taking a long-term view, the industry has seen a few distinct phases in how competition has evolved. The concept of practice groups emerged in the 1980s. This then progressed to scale and geographic expansion in the golden age of globalisation of the 1990s. The 2000s saw the outsourcing trend engulf the market as legal process outsourcing companies and legal managed service firms (NewLaw firms) were conceived. In this decade, the 2010s, the technological trend gave birth to LegalTech firms. Not to forget also the entry of the Big Six accounting firms in the 1990s that culminated in the Big Five becoming one of the largest in the world in the early 2000s. Since the 2010s, we have seen the Big Four establishing their legal offering in various forms.

#LexTech18 Quick Chats: Hannah Lim, LexisNexis

By Josh Lee

On 23rd October 2018

In Access to Justice, Events, Internet Governance, Interviews, Lawyers, Legal Innovation, People

Reading time: 5 minutes

Interview by Josh Lee | Edited byHuiling Xie

Organised by Malaysian legal tech startup CanLaw, LexTech Conference 2018is an APAC-wide legal technology conference taking place from 25 to 26 October 2018 in Kuala Lumpur. The Conference aims to drive legal tech adoption in the region and strengthen the regional legal tech community. In the lead-up to LexTech Conference 2018, LawTech.Asia will be bringing to you regular interviews and shout-outs covering prominent individuals who are involved in the conference.

LawTech.Asia spoke with Hannah Lim, Head of Rule of Law and Emerging Markets at LexisNexis (“LN”). Hannah will be speaking on the topic of “How technology will transform the business of law” at LexTech. Picking up on this exciting topic, we ask Hannah about how legal tech can play a pivotal role in shaping the rule of law in emerging markets, and how this interplays with the need to provide better access to justice for all.

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What got you interested in the first place in exploring the advancement of the rule of law in emerging markets such as Myanmar?

Before joining LN, I was a corporate lawyer based in Myanmar, which explains my focus on Myanmar. I had been doing Myanmar legal work since 2011 and during my time there, I could really see how important a strong legal system was to society, and how it would affect the man on the street. It was something that I had taken for granted, and my experience has taught me that a robust society with a strong legal system and healthy institutions (such as the rule of law) is something that has to be deliberately built and maintained. It doesn’t materialize on its own and the process of building and maintaining these institutions is not easy. So, advancing the rule of law isn’t just a job for me; it’s closely tied together with my journey as a legal professional.

#LexTech18 Quick Chats: Aditya Shivkumar, Resolve Disputes Online (RDO)

By Josh Lee

On 30th September 2018

In Artificial Intelligence, Blockchain, Contracts, Cybersecurity, Dispute Resolution, Events, Interviews, Lawyers, Legal Innovation, Online Dispute Resolution, People, Smart Contracts

Reading time: 3 minutes

Interview by Jennifer Lim, Josh Lee, and Ong Chin Ngee | Edited by Josh Lee

Organised by Malaysian legal tech startup CanLaw, LexTech Conference 2018 is an APAC-wide regional legal technology conference taking place from 25 to 26 October 2018 in Kuala Lumpur. LexTech Conference 2018 aims to drive legal tech adoption in the region and strengthen the regional legal tech community. In the lead-up to LexTech Conference 2018, the LawTech.Asia team will be bringing to you regular interviews and shout-outs covering prominent individuals who are involved in the conference.

LawTech.Asia spoke with Aditya Shivkumar, Co-Founder of Resolve Disputes Online (“RDO”), about smart contracts and online dispute resolution (“ODR”) – a topic that Aditya will be speaking on at the LexTech Conference.

What are smart contracts, and what sort of transactions can it be used for? How specifically do you think smart contracts can be applied in ODR?

Smart contracts are not your conventional paper-based contracts. It actually consists of lines of code. There are multiple coding languages for smart contracts, such as Solidity or Bamboo (if one is executing a smart contract on the Ethereum network). Smart contracts utilise blockchain technology. The former is the front-end, while the latter is the back-end.

#LexTech18 Quick Chats: Fareez Shah, Fareez Shah & Partners

By Amelia Chew

On 29th September 2018

In Artificial Intelligence, Automation, Events, Interviews, Law Firms, Lawyers, Legal Innovation, Regulations

Reading time: 4 minutes

Interview by Amelia Chew | Edited by Huiling Xie

Organised by Malaysian legal tech startup CanLaw, LexTech Conference 2018 is an APAC-wide legal technology conference taking place from 25 to 26 October 2018 in Kuala Lumpur that aims to drive legal tech adoption in the region and strengthen the regional legal tech community. In the lead-up to LexTech Conference 2018, the LawTech.Asia team will be bringing to you regular interviews and shout-outs covering prominent individuals who are involved in the conference.

LawTech.Asia spoke with Fareez Shah, Managing Partner at Fareez Shah & Partners (FSP). Since the inception of FSP, Fareez Shah has represented and acted for various startups and social enterprises with various types of work, which includes setting-up, fundraising, compliance and risk management. In this interview, Fareez shares about his experience in implementing tech solutions within his practice.

Broadly, how would you characterise the legal tech scene in Malaysia? Are Malaysian law firms embracing machine language, artificial intelligence and cloud-based services?

I can’t speak on behalf of other law firms, but I can share my firm’s view of the legal tech market in Malaysia. Fundamentally, as I believe that the implementation of new technology is meant to improve productivity and in turn improve the quality of work and revenue, I will look at the ROI before investing in new tech. For a small firm like ours, we would love to adopt and embrace more technologies such as Machine Learning, Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Cloud-Based Services. However, most of the off-the-shelf products are either (a) too expensive (e.g. Clio, Tessaract, KIRA) and/or (b) not suitable for local usage (e.g. ROSS and eBrevia). A good example is MailChimp, which we use to automate some of our routine emails. However, as MailChimp is a platform built for e-commerce, it is not a full solution for us and we have to use it in combination with platforms for other services such as payment collection.