Artificial intelligence is transforming the legal industry, according to Harvard Law School graduate Logan Brown, who says the technology is already changing how firms deploy talent, price work and compete for clients.
Brown argues that the traditional BigLaw model, built around large teams of highly paid associates, is facing a profound challenge as AI takes on tasks that were once assigned to junior lawyers.
He recalls that his first assignment at a law firm involved manually making signature lines the same length across 18 documents. The client was charged more than $600 an hour for the work, despite it being administrative rather than legal.
That experience, he suggests, reflects a long-standing practice in which companies and individuals paid premium rates for young associates with prestigious qualifications to complete routine tasks. He believes that model is now beginning to disappear.
AI reshapes the legal industry
Brown says the use of AI in white-collar professions remains at an early stage, with lawyers still raising concerns about fabricated answers, errors and other shortcomings. Even so, he argues that the technology is already altering day-to-day legal practice.
He identifies Harvey and Legora as two of the companies that have accelerated the change. Both have become major names in legal technology, operating more like technology businesses than conventional law companies and attracting valuations of $15 billion and $5.6 billion respectively, according to Brown.
The companies have also pursued high-profile marketing, including sponsorship of sports leagues and billboard campaigns featuring celebrities. Their rise has helped turn legal technology into one of Silicon Valley’s most closely watched sectors.
Law firms are responding by recruiting leading engineers and developing technology operations behind the scenes. Brown says that convergence between the legal and technology industries would have been difficult to imagine when he was studying at Harvard.
He also believes the change could weaken the dominance of the largest firms. Lawyers, he says, are increasingly questioning whether they need the infrastructure and training systems provided by major practices, while prominent partners are leaving with their client relationships.
Brown points to Chris Kercher’s departure from Quinn Emanuel to establish a smaller, technology-focused firm as an early example of that movement rather than an isolated case.
His forecast is that many BigLaw firms will be considerably smaller within a decade. At the same time, he argues, AI could widen access to high-quality legal services by making specialist knowledge and resources available to more people.
That would reduce the advantage currently enjoyed by the limited number of clients able to afford the largest firms, Brown says, while creating more opportunities for young lawyers outside the traditional route of working long hours in hierarchical practices without a share of profits.
At the AI-powered law firm Brown runs, he says hundreds of applications are now received each day from students seeking to work in a profession undergoing rapid technological change.
