Guest post by ASEAN LegalTech
The LegalTech segment has now moved into the mainstream consciousness of the legal market across Asia and in particular the South East Asian region. While the global LegalTech narrative is dominated by mature legal markets like Australia, Europe and the USA, there is no shortage of LegalTech startups building innovative solutions across the ten countries that compose the Association of South East Asian Nations (“ASEAN”).
ASEAN LegalTech (“ALT”) was formed in May 2019 with the aim of connecting LegalTech pioneers, thought leaders and enthusiasts to promote and build the LegalTech ecosystem in the South East Asian markets. One of ASEAN LegalTech’s goals is to provide a voice to the emerging market to inform discussions with regulators who are in the early stages of determining how to regulate LegalTech.
The regional organisation is the brainchild of Founding Board, Eric Chin, Principal at Alpha Creates. He is joined by a Founding Board consisting of senior members of the legal and LegalTech community in the region like Andrew Stoutley, Chief Operating Officer at Tilleke & Gibbins, Cherilyn Tan, Founder at Interstellar Group, Hanim Hamzah, Managing Partner at ZICO Law, Michael Lew, Chief Operating Officer at Rajah & Tann Technologies, and Thomas Thoppil, Vice President & Deputy General Counsel at Hewlett Packard Enterprise.
To accomplish its goals, ALT will focus on:
- Building, connecting and growing a community for LegalTech in the ASEAN region through an online platform and monthly events (meet ups, legal hackathons, industry presentations, etc).
- Starting the LegalTech dialogue in the ASEAN region and specifically in the region’s legal industry.
- Building a platform to feature and cultivate the growth of the LegalTech scene in the ASEAN region.
- Promoting entrepreneurial culture amongst legal industry constituents, namely lawyers (private practice and in-house lawyers), technologists and regulators.
- Building the go-to platform for thought leadership initiatives on LegalTech in the ASEAN region.
ALT also boast a group of founding ambassadors made up of technology companies, in-house legal teams, and private practice lawyers across Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam.
The association’s inaugural project is a whitepaper on the state of the LegalTech market in South East Asia (link: https://www.aseanlegaltech.com/product/white-paper-state-of-the-legaltech-market-in-southeast-asia/). In which, Gregory Vijayendran, the President of the Law Society of Singapore shared his perspective on ASEAN LegalTech: “It takes an incredible vision to build regionally in a futuristic and forward looking way. It takes insight and impulsion to break out of inertia and break past the status quo to break through into innovation. ASEAN Legal Tech has the potential to serve as both a compass and a telescope for lawyers”
ALT is also a community partner for Thomson Reuters’ upcoming pitch day, TR Ignite, at the TechLaw.Fest in September.
The South East Asian organisation has already developed a global network of LegalTech associations like Australian Legal Technology Association (“ALTA”), European Legal Technology Association (“ELTA”), International Legal Technology Association (“ILTA”) and Legal Tech New Zealand (“LTNZ”).
For more information about ALT, see www.aseanlegaltech.com.
For queries about ALT, please email secretariat@aseanlegaltech.com.
This piece was contributed by ASEAN LegalTech.