How IE Law School´s new initiative will lead legal innovation in Spain

Legaltech is transforming the legal industry and legal education in ways never imagined. In this sense, IE Law School responds to the challenges and opportunities that lie ahead with a multidimensional approach by introducing open innovation ecosystems with the mission of bringing together law firms, legal departments of corporations, technology providers and experts to accelerate the creation of tech-based solutions to the greatest challenges affecting legal actors and legal systems.

"In the academic field, legaltech was seen as a niche subject, that is why law schools approach to legaltech has been pretty shy, until now,” said Javier de Cendra, dean of IE Law School. Nonetheless, De Cendra recognizes that, in the last two years, new developments in legaltech along with the appearance of new business models, have revolutionized the sector. Ross (popularly known as the artificial intelligence lawyer), LexPredict, Axiom and Riverview, just to name a few, are important initiatives that have led to important advances in the sector.

“Open innovation ecosystems linking up technology experts -e.g. experts in artificial intelligence, machine learning and big data, software providers, large corporations, entrepreneurs and investors have accelerated innovation across many sectors of the economy. We want to apply these tried and tested models to the legal sector. The goal is not just to innovate for its own sake, but rather to learn how technology can help lawyers, judges, lawmakers, and jurists, in general, improve the cause of justice worldwide”, explained Javier de Cendra, Dean of IE Law School.

“A typical IE Legaltech Lab consists of a project director, a technologist, a lawyer, and a design thinking professional. These labs, designed to create solutions to legal challenges that a firm or in-house counsel faces, involves a six-step cycle that begins with an exploration phase and concludes with the launch and test of a software proof of concept”, explained Macarena Plaza Vela, Head of International Programmes and Legal Innovation at IE Law School.

Big multinationals such as Banco Santander, top international law firms such as Allen & Overy, Baker McKenzie, Deloitte and Linklaters, and  giant tech companies like IBM and Microsoft are taking part in this initiative.

"The project caught our attention from the first moment. We will have the opportunity to interact and share different points of view with tech companies, law firms, etc. We will also have the opportunity to develop and test different projects that are related to the application of technology in our professional activity,” said Íñigo Berricano, Managing partner of Linklaters in Spain.

Antonio Vázquez-Guillén, co-director and partner of Allen & Overy in Spain, explained that technology applied to legal service— and the demands of clients— is accelerating the transformation in the sector. “At A&O we foster a constant culture of innovation that allows our lawyers to access leading initiatives in the sector. Amongst other initiatives, we recently launched Fuse, an incubator and collaborative space of technological innovation in London. Integrating new technological solutions constitutes a differentiating element in a law firm”.

Read the article published in Expansión Jurídico here

Sergio Saiz for Expansión Jurídico