As October comes to a close,
I’d like to continue my tradition of mentioning some of the interesting
startups I’ve been watching. Although I no longer practice law, I’ve actually
been pretty good at picking some winners on some of my previous lists. Just
a month after appearing on my August list, Doxly raised $2.2M in seed funding; another startup that
appeared on that same list was Lexicata, and Michael Chasin and his
team were crushing it at the Clio Conference in September. These are not
full, exhaustive write-ups of these companies; think of them, instead, as just
enough to put these companies on your radar and encourage you to learn more.
So, without further ado, here
are three companies I’ve been watching this October:
1. Alt Legal. If you’ve ever filed a trademark application, you
know what a mess the USPTO’s site can be from a user perspective. Not only does
is it not particularly easy to use, but it regularly will shut down without
saving your information and then *poof* you’re back to square one. Alt Legal
has created a user friendly interface that reduces the normal time for
trademark applications, which in my experience can range from 1-2 hours to a
matter of minutes. After your TM is filed, Alt Legal lets you know about
critical dates and information regarding your IP. Alt Legal instantly reminded
me of Anaqua for small firms and solo practitioners.
If
you’ve got a practice that does any kind of trademark work in 2016, Alt Legal
is a must.
2. PrimaFacie. It shouldn’t come as a shock then that using the
government’s online immigration portal is about as user friendly as the USPTO.
While SimpleCitizen is trying to remove the need for a lawyer in
immigration cases, the Betzold brothers (James, Jacob and Michael) behind
PrimaFacie think it makes more sense to make the job of immigration lawyers and
their paralegals easier. What they’ve created is a CRM for immigration that
handles and tracks all stages. I met these Betzold brothers at the Clio
Conference and was impressed, not only with their software, but with how
engaged Clio’s CEO Jack Newton seemed to be with their mission.
3. jEuegene. I don’t understand how any corporate
lawyer is not using jEugene. If you’ve ever been subjected to the agony of
proofreading legal documents looking for section changes or trivial
inconsistencies in the definition sections (can you tell that I’ve done this
kind of nonsense), then you probably realize that a robot (or a trained monkey)
could probably do a better job. jEugene, another legal tech company to come out
of Y Combinator hasn’t trained monkeys,
but they have built valuable software that will take care of proofreading your
documents, so that you can focus on the big picture items and sleep tight
knowing that your documents (some of which might be publicly filed) don’t have
mistakes.
If I were still a practicing corporate attorney at a Biglaw practice,
I would consider splurging on a jEuegene subscription so I could reduce the
time spent doing busy work.
Have you used any of these
products (or competing products)? If so, I’d love to hear from you and see if
you think they’re adding value to your practice. Do you have another startup
that belongs on my list for November? If so, shoot me an email — but make sure
to read this first.
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