Worcestershire and Gloucestershire based Thomson & Bancks LLP are to be the first firm to implement a hosted version of Partner for Windows, after choosing TikitTFB as their preferred supplier to replace their ageing IRIS FoxPro system. They follow May’s announcement of Marchants Solicitors who also chose to switch in favour of Partner for Windows.

 

The firm, who have been in operation for over 170 years, will be deploying Partner for Windows to merge the two separate FoxPro systems they are currently running at each of their offices, providing the firm with a single, consolidated solution. They have chosen to run the 58 user system remotely via a hosted solution to be provided by ACM IT Solutions. The hosting solution is due to go live in early August with the entire Partner for Windows project to be completed by October.

 

The introduction of a hosted Partner for Windows system will enable the firm to bring together disparate parts of the business, centralising and reducing duplication of work and providing a streamlined approach to the firm’s case management processes in the areas of Business Law, Family, Private Client, Litigation and Property.

 

David Roberts, Project Leader at the firm comments, ‘We reviewed other suppliers who offer a complete hosted solution but the depth of functionality that Partner for Windows could offer us overall far outweighed those options. Coupled with the solution being hosted by ACM, we have a powerful business tool that will allow our staff to work anywhere, anytime and will provide us with significant savings across the firm.’

 

‘We have so far been impressed with TikitTFB’s approach to our project, openly willing to work with our chosen hosted supplier to provide us with a solution bespoke to our needs.’

FTI Consulting, Inc today announced that its FTI Technology business segment has launched the enhanced Ringtail Analytics module for the market-leading Ringtail e-discovery platform.

The updated offering includes the popular clustering and visual review capabilities of Document Mapper as well as two components, Smart Decision and Concept Mapper, designed to assist in early case assessments (ECA), keyword testing and the faster creation of review assignments. In total, the expanded Ringtail Analytics module provides powerful data analytics and visual review tools that together dramatically increase the productivity and efficiency of legal review.

“Ringtail Analytics has produced tangible productivity gains for our review teams and we expect it will provide substantial cost savings to our clients moving forward,” said Danny Chan, eDiscovery/litigation support project manager of Bereskin & Parr LLP. “As data volumes grow, linear review technology becomes inefficient. Fortunately, Ringtail Analytics lets us smartly cut through the data, understand key concepts and review relevant documents faster and more effectively.”  

Ringtail Analytics is comprised of three complementary components:

•    Smart Decision: Smart Decision helps clients rapidly test and sample keywords across millions of documents while also providing advanced whole-case reporting and familiar pivot table capabilities to track project status and review metrics.
•    Concept Mapper: Concept Mapper organizes large-scale document collections by key concepts and concept frequency into a simple and easy-to-use dashboard. Using Concept Mapper, legal teams can quickly build assignments based on specific themes then route to the Ringtail review workflow which ensures that the most important documents will be reviewed first.
•    Document Mapper: The Document Mapper review interface is an integrated component of the Ringtail Analytics module and can be used at any stage of the e-discovery or review process, including for early case assessments, investigations, preparing for depositions or for quality control of reviewed documents.

“In a recent study, 39 percent of Fortune 1000 inside counsel respondents said they are using visualization and clustering tools to speed the review process,” said Ed Pfromer, senior managing director, FTI Technology. “This number is likely to grow as legal teams realize that linear review is no longer an adequate solution for e-discovery volumes and court-defined deadlines. We were an early innovator in visualization and clustering for e-discovery, and with this enhanced release, Ringtail Analytics further refines the user experience and greatly expands the reach of these critical technologies to encompass larger data sets and more use cases than ever before.”

Through its comprehensive portfolio of e-discovery software, services and consulting, FTI Technology is transforming the way corporations and their law firms globally manage e-discovery for legal and regulatory events. Through offerings such as FTI Acuity, FTI Technology’s e-discovery services and consulting help streamline the entire e-discovery process and can provide clients a single point of e-discovery accountability. The comprehensive portfolio of FTI Technology software, including Attenex and Ringtail, delivers advanced technology for the most mission-critical and costly steps of e-discovery. FTI Technology’s e-discovery software can be deployed either on-premise or on-demand as a hosted solution, a hybrid capability that helps clients scale to the unique demands of each legal matter without sacrificing a consistent and cost-effective e-discovery process. Altogether, FTI Technology provides a smart and comprehensive approach to improve the e-discovery process, contain costs without cutting corners, and manage client’s critical enterprise information demands.

BigHand has today announced its plan for the convergence of the BigHand and nFlow technologies. A new converged product; BigHand v4, will be launched on Nov 4^th 2010 at the BigHand Annual User Conference and will combine the best features of both technologies in a new BigHand product. BigHand v4 will enable all customers within the BigHand Group to access an unrivalled voice productivity toolkit and will enhance their document production and mobile efficiency even further.

 

Rob Lancashire, BigHand Managing Director for UK Legal & Professional Services commented:

 

“Since the acquisition of nFlow I have spoken with customers about the best way forward and there has been overwhelming support for the convergence of the product streams as it offers both nFlow & BigHand customers the best of both worlds. Equally we acknowledge a customer desire for flexibility and a caveat to the convergence plan is that we intend to allow firms to do this at their own speed and not be forced to upgrade by any set deadline. I believe the plan we have in place delivers BigHand and nFlow end-users a combination of product improvements and technical consistency, and is a result of engaging quickly and directly with the customer base post-acquisition. We will continue to evolve the plan to ensure a seamless migration path to the converged version, and an upgrade that delivers significant value.”

 

Asif Ali, BigHand Head of Products, commented:

 

“The BigHand Group is committed to the long term support of users on current versions 4 and 5 of the nFlow system, including the nFlow mobility apps, and there are no plans to discontinue either product. As testament to our support, BigHand’s Analytics package comprising a suite of Crystal reports will be integrated with nFlow software, and be made available this summer. However, following the next service release for nFlow v5, nFlow development resource will then be concentrated on the converged product which will effectively become the next major release for the nFlow product stream. This will also mean that a number of the innovative nFlow functions will be available to BigHand users as part of their upgrade to BigHand v4.’’

 

BigHand will honour all existing nFlow Annual Maintenance and Support contracts for all firms including those wanting to migrate to BigHand v3.4 or future v4 products. Furthermore, the migration will replicate the existing nFlow configuration as closely as possible making the process simple and straightforward, but give access to significantly enhanced mobility, workflow and voice-to-text functionality including:

 

·         BigHand for BlackBerry® v4

·         BigHand for iPhone™

·         BigHand Integration with Microsoft® Office

·         Email Notification + Document Return

·         Advanced Reporting + Analytics

·         Server-based Speech Recognition

Existing BigHand v3 users will be able to seamlessly upgrade to BigHand v4 as per their standard process to date and with little or no change to their existing infrastructure or system set-up.

 

More information is available at a series of breakfast briefings being held at the following locations:

 

Weds 23rd June            8am-10am         Liverpool

Thurs 24th June 8am-10am         Leeds

Fri 25th June                 8am-10am         Newcastle

Thurs 1st July                8am-10am         Edinburgh

Tikit is delighted to announce the signing of a three year contract with Fox Williams LLP to outsource all IT Support and Service functions.

Under this agreement, Tikit will provide Fox Williams with a fully Managed Service Support Desk, technical 3rd line infrastructure support, ‘Out of Hours’ user support, IT training and IT directorial consultancy.  This service commenced on Monday 14th June.

Jeremy Gubbay, Chief Operating Officer at Fox Williams said “We have been impressed by the way that Tikit have supported us over the last year, and we are looking forward to benefiting from the expertise of a large IT-led organisation.  Tikit are a company with many resources that we can take advantage of, while their benchmarking process will ensure that our IT organisation and standards are comparable with, or exceed those of our competitors.  A prime example of this is the provision of ‘Out of Hours’ cover and continuous back fill, which requires a level of resource that we currently do not have available”.

Derek Kindercliff-Jones, Head of Managed Services at Tikit, explained “Fox Williams is a dynamic, forward-looking City law firm, and we are proud to be working so closely with them to provide a complete, scaleable and dependable IT service.  We have been working with Fox Williams since June 2009, providing infrastructure advice and support to their onsite IT team.  We have all worked together to develop a sound working relationship, and it's great to have the opportunity to extend this partnership into the complete outsourcing package.  Our experience in legal support services, and the resources we have available, make Tikit ideally suited to provide complete contractual services of this nature.  We look forward to providing Fox Williams not just with a first-class day-to-day service and IT management, but with long-term strategic and implementation services to support their growth”.

David Lumsden, Tikit CEO, commented “We are very pleased that Fox Williams has selected Tikit as its partner to deliver IT services.  Our knowledge of law firms, legal applications and the infrastructure that supports them is second to none, and it is this knowledge and experience which we are placing at the disposal of Fox Williams to ensure they have the cost-effective and professional IT services they need, as the firm continues to grow".

HotDocs Limited (formerly Capsoft UK) today announced the release of the HotDocs 10 suite.

The company acquired worldwide rights to the award winning document automation and assembly software in November 2009 after purchasing the HotDocs business from LexisNexis.

Russell Shepherd, Managing Director of HotDocs Limited, said “The release of HotDocs 10 marks the first in a series of announcements which will create significant changes in the document assembly market.”

This latest version of the software has been specifically developed to support the upcoming release of Microsoft Office 2010 and, in addition, will be Microsoft Silverlight enabled.

The most noteworthy changes to the suite involve HotDocs Server 10, the company’s innovative technology for deploying HotDocs document templates via the internet.

Many of HotDocs’ global customers utilise the software to generate simple or more complex documents, such as legal contracts and sophisticated loan agreements which can run to hundreds of pages with literally thousands of variables.

With the launch of HotDocs 10, the development team have integrated with Silverlight to offer customers a vastly improved product.

“The Silverlight integration is a giant step forward for three reasons,” explained Lowell Stewart, Director of Software Development for HotDocs.  “Firstly, interviews for server-based HotDocs templates can now be accessed using Internet Explorer or Firefox on Windows and Safari or Firefox for Mac OS. In the past, server interviews were limited to Internet Explorer.”

He continued: “Secondly, the new interviews have an updated look and feel – a fact which users should notice immediately.  Finally, and this one is the real game changer, new interviews will run ten to twenty times faster than JavaScript based interviews.”

Stewart’s enthusiasm for the HotDocs Server upgrade is echoed by Leonard DuCharme, US VP of Marketing at HotDocs, who said:  “The JavaScript based interviews were functional, but slow.  Silverlight dramatically accelerates the interview process, which improves productivity and ultimately saves money for the client.”

Shepherd continued:  “Since the takeover, our assessment of the overall market potential has been extremely positive – we’re of the opinion that the business has a much greater reach and potential than our original estimate.”

“Long established as the market leader in the legal market, HotDocs has also made substantial inroads into wholesale penetration of the US corporate marketplace.  We fully expect the adoption rate of HotDocs to vastly accelerate now that the business is in independent hands and is fully focussed on creating the very best document automation software company in the world.”

He concluded:  “Further developments from HotDocs will be announced over the coming months which will change the document assembly landscape still further-  this is just the beginning”.

Top 150 law firm Howes Percival LLP is a leading commercial practice with 275 partners and staff and offices in Leicester, Milton Keynes, Northampton and Norwich. Renowned for top quality service and recognised as a forward thinking practice, the firm has selected the LawSoft Practice Management solution incorporating Legal Accounts, Case Management, Document Management and Customer Relationship Management (CRM) to replace their legacy Iris AIM system.

 

Howes Percival Finance Director Alastair Mearns states “We are delighted to have chosen Pilgrim to supply our next practice management system and are looking forward to the benefits we expect LawSoft to bring to our business. Key for us has been the intuitive, easy to use capability of LawSoft, which at the same time is sufficiently comprehensive to have responded to virtually every test we have put it to in our selection process. We anticipate that this and the straightforward pragmatism of the Pilgrim team will be the foundation of a productive relationship for many years to come.”

 

Pilgrim COO Colin Kennedy observes that “Howes Percival is another significant new client win for us. In line with many other practices they have identified the key strengths of our solution as being an ideal combination of flexible software, leading edge technology and experienced people, plus a stable business roadmap that provides the assurances buyers seek in an ever changing commercial world.”

One of the largest law firms in the Thames Valley – Harris Cartier LLP – is modernising its legal software fundamentally with a switch to SOS Connect from Solicitors Own Software (SOS). SOS Connect will replace the current Axxia system in order to achieve standardised procedures, easier to use systems, improved management information and the extension of case management to more departments.

Founded in 1922 Harris Cartier operates from offices in Slough and London providing a wide range of commercial and private client legal services.

Chief executive David McIntosh, commenting on the IT modernisation programme, said: “The initial driver was the need to become more competitive in an increasingly competitive marketplace. Our old IT system was not as easy to use as we would like and no longer met our business requirements fully. We were looking for an integrated system that would enable us to instil standard, best practices and be so easy to use that we could ensure adoption and widespread use of the new system’s features by the whole firm.”

From a short list of software suppliers, which included the incumbent supplier LexisNexis Axxia and IRIS with Law Business Software, Harris Cartier selected SOS Connect for a number of reasons including the intuitive nature of the software. “We liked the way that e-mails are captured and automatically stored into each case, the automation of  time recording and the ability for partners to create management reports without redress to the IT department,” said David McIntosh. “Having a more straightforward and user-friendly system means that we also plan to extend case management to new departments in addition to personal injury and conveyancing and use SOS Connect for customer relationship management. This is a fundamental change to the way we operate and one that we expect to greatly improve efficiency and our service to clients.”

SOS Connect is expected to go live for over 60 users in the Slough and London offices of Harris Cartier in the autumn.

David McNamara, managing director of SOS said: “Often we tend to overlook the importance of SOS Connect being intuitive and easy to use. It is a very significant advantage in helping a firm to gain buy-in from staff and therefore commitment to use the system to best effect throughout the firm. The more extensively the software is used the faster the return on investment. We look forward to assisting Harris Cartier in updating their systems and being able to meet the challenges ahead.”

Wright Hassall LLP has chosen Linetime for their market leading debt recovery solution DebtimeSQL – part of the Liberate legal software suite.

Sarah Perry, Partner and Head of Litigation comments “With an increasing demand for our debt recovery and possession services this was the right time to upgrade to a higher spec system in order to continue to improve the service we offer our blue chip clients.

We were aware of Liberates reputation in the market and our system review highlighted the reasons why it is so highly regarded. The team is looking forward to working with Linetime to support our program of expansion and commitment to servicing client SLAs”.

The contract also includes the Liberate Online case tracking and integration with Worksite, the firms’ document management solution.
Tony Klejnow, Linetime Managing Director, comments “We are delighted to have been selected by Wright Hassall LLP and look forward to working with their professional team in taking their business processes forward.”

Russell & Russell, one of the north-west's leading law firms, with 200 staff across 8 offices, has implemented Eclipse's Proclaim Case Management Software for its Personal Injury team.

The practice provides a full range of services to private and commercial clients across the UK, and has seen rapid recent growth in its Personal Injury claims department.  The department carries its own brand name – The Personal Injury People – and now employs 50 staff to provide an end-to-end claims service.

Proclaim has been rolled out to every member of the Personal Injury team, providing a single desktop solution for all case tasks.  Proclaim provides complete case management integrating time recording, document management and an advanced reporting toolset.  Russell & Russell has also implemented Proclaim's 'Automated Task Manager' tool which will enable the firm to schedule, automate, and distribute management information, without the need for user intervention.

Bath based Stone King Sewell (SKS) is a dynamic 170 staff strong practice with a national reputation for the provision of legal advice to schools, charities, Private Clients and other not-for-profit institutions.

Recognising the importance of implementing a leading class system that is capable of supporting their evolution from a regional player to a national force, and in common with many other law firms, SKS identified the need for a sophisticated, fully integrated, Microsoft based system to support the efficient operation of its business.
 As a result the firm will be replacing its SOS system with LawSoft's full Practice Management Suite including Financial Management, Document Management, CRM and Case Management (replacing LexisNexis SolCase).

Colin Kennedy Pilgrim's COO commented, “We are experiencing an exceptionally strong period of growth. SKS and businesses like them recognise the unique proposition Pilgrim has in providing a mature, advanced solution from a well run and customer focussed business. We are delighted to be working with SKS and supporting their future plans.”

SKS’ Managing Partner, Steven Greenwood, said of the firm’s decision, "We are very impressed with Pilgrim and are looking forward to meeting the challenges we face with the help of their excellent product and service. We do not want the concerns two databases bring; we wanted a true single database, Microsoft based solution, and we want to continue to develop a relationship with a supplier that we enjoy working with.”