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Legal work is unbelievably labor- and time - intensive , requiring piece together cases from vast amounts of evidence . That ’s force some business firm to pilot AI to streamline certain steps;accordingto a 2023 view by the American Bar Association , 35 % of natural law firms now use AI tools in their practice .
OpenAI - backed Harvey is among the big winnersso far in the burgeon AI legal technical school outer space , alongside startups such asLeyaandKlarity . But there ’s elbow room for one more , says Jerry Zhou and Kyle Lam , the co - founders of an AI political platform for personal injury law calledSupio , which emerged from stealth Tuesday with a $ 25 million investiture top by Sapphire Ventures .
Supio apply generative AI to automate bulk information collection and collection for sound teams . In add-on to sum up information , the platform can organize and identify single file — and snippets within files — that might be useful in draft , drafting and presenting a causa , Zhou say .
“ After attending numerous conferences and meeting with hundreds of attorney across the U.S. , Lam and I resolve to concentrate on personal injury and heap civil wrong complainant law , ” said Zhou , who ’s also Supio ’s chief operating officer . “ These are praxis areas that require compiling thousands of documents from multiple sources , and analyse and finding information from the data within them . ”
Zhou and Lam are childhood friends whose career paths have often intersected . The dyad worked at Microsoft , specifically in the Office 365 org , and together again at revenue enhancement compliance package firm Avalara .
The idea for Supio came about after Zhou and Lam leave behind Avalara to pursue build a commercial enterprise that could , in Zhou ’s words , “ help see complex information and identify decisive connections within certain information . ”
“ We pursued the sound industriousness because we know it was n’t just document - impenetrable — it was also due for technology innovation , ” Zhou said . “ [ These are ] practice areas that require compiling thousands of documents from multiple sources and analyse and finding data from the datum within them . ”
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Personal injury and aggregate tort cases , or civil courtship filed on behalf of dupe harm by negligence , like the sales agreement of defective products , typically unfold across paperwork including medical records , law reports , indemnity claim , fiscal statements , consumer complaints and so on . What Supio does , Zhou explained , is generate demand letters — letters outlining the legal difference to be resolve — as well as supporting documentation , while letting users search the evidence through a chatbot - type interface .
It vocalize a lot likeEvenUp , a startup that taps AI to generate sound document to assess combat injury cases . company likeLawyawandAtriumalso put on AI to the task of drafting initial complaints .
But Zhou claims that Supio is more complex in its technical approach .
“ Law is highly complex and nuanced , and most creators of work productiveness tools miss a genuine understanding of the effectual papers attorney finally have to produce , which curb the developing of precise [ AI ] models , ” Zhou said . “ Supio has hundreds of models running at a given time with different subprogram to render to understand and classify documents . We then measure this against the employment products that are have a bun in the oven and amend these results gradually . ”
AI like Supio ’s is powerful clobber in theory — but also pregnant . give the sore nature of most legal difference , lawyers and law house might be reluctant to grant ( or be prohibit from granting ) a tool like Supio memory access to any subject docs .
tardily last year , the State Bar of Californiareleasedguidance instructing legal professionals to refrain from putting clients ’ info into AI peter that “ miss reasonable or tolerable protection . ” ( Zhou says that Supio stores client data in its country of origin and has security protocols that bind to concealment regulations including HIPAA and GDPR . )
Another concern with AI legal technical school is AI’sperjurious proclivity . Last year , a group of lawyers with the firm Levidow , Levidow & Oberman , P.C.tappedChatGPT , OpenAI ’s AI - powered chatbot , to prepare a personal injury complaint against an airline . The result was fateful : ChatGPT invented quotation , misidentified judges and referred to air hose that do n’t exist . The federal judge manage the case ultimatelyimposeda $ 5,000 fine on the lawyers and their employer .
court are frantically preparing for a climb in inaccurate filings attributable to the uptake in AI effectual inquiry tools .
In November 2023 , the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuitproposeda rule ( sincescrapped ) requiring that any professional filing sound paperwork draft with the service of AI certify that a human brush up the documents for truth and okay them . Earlier that same year , a territory judge in Texas issued an orderbanningthe use of generative AI to write court filings without a human fact - check .
The risks with AI are such that , in a recentsurveyof more than 300 general counselor-at-law and aged sound officers at large corporations , 25 % said that they believe their remote counsel should n’t use AI . A separatepollby Thomson Reuters rule that one in five law firm have go forth warnings around the use of AI .
Zhou stimulate the noteworthy claim that Supio ’s AI performs “ better than human levels of truth ” and “ without hallucination , ” i.e. it never fib .
“ Supio is providing compromising software sport AI that can direct amorphous data and produce reliable upshot because we know timing and accuracy are vital , ” he said .
It ’s not clear what ’s meant by “ human level ; ” Zhou did n’t share any test or benchmark result . But I would note that just because AI can achieve feats like passing the barroom test does n’t mean it has the skills lawyer gain through experience and education . ( The National Conference of Bar Examinersarguesas much . ) As for the “ without hallucination ” bit of Zhou ’s title , it ’s not backed up by information , either — at least none that Zhou volunteered .
Yet some firms believe Supio has hope .
According to Zhou , Supio is currently working with around 30 personal harm and spate tort law business firm and expect that number to get through 100 firms by the end of the year . The startup ’s yearly recur revenue has eclipsed $ 1 million , meanwhile , with most of the money coming from subscription fee that Supio charges based on case volume .
It could be a eccentric of keeping up with the Joneses .
In asurveyof effectual execs published by LexisNexis , near all ( 90 % ) enunciate that they anticipate their investment in productive AI will increase over the next five class ; the same poll found that 43 % of business firm now have a consecrated budget for generative AI . Gartnerpredictsthat the allure of generative AI will aim the effectual tech market to $ 50 billion in value by 2027 , almost doubly what it was worth in 2022 ( $ 25.6 million ) .
Against this dramatic background , Seattle - based Supio keeps chugging along . The society has 27 employee and expects to double headcount in the next 12 month .
Having raised a sum of $ 33 million , Zhou says that Supio aims to expand its client substructure in the near terminal figure — and eventually to “ scale to accost other law specialities . ”
