Interview Dr. Jochen Brandhoff, LEGAL ®EVOLUTION – The European Legal Tech Expo & Congress, Frankfurt
"A lawyer who refrains from using new digital technologies works inefficiently and at some point is no longer competitive. When a lawyer tells me that he or she is not interested in using new digital technologies such as contract automation, knowledge management and e-discovery, I ask them: what are you doing .."(Brandhoff)
The legal services industry, unlike comparable industries, has managed to survive without significant changes over the last 50 years, so the digitalisation of the legal market is still in its infancy. The objections therefore stem from the well-known argument "we have always done it this way".
The decisive question, however, is: "Quo vadis Advocatus?"
In which direction is the classical profession of the lawyer and the application of law developing in the course of digitalisation?
Already today, computer algorithms perform the examination of claims and notices, such as the examination of certain claims of air passengers or the examination of a Hartz IV notice, thus applying the law. An extensive expansion of algorithm-based legal application is to be expected in the future.
The digitalisation of law has accelerated rapidly and will fundamentally change the order and structures of the legal market. This fact is reinforced by the tendency of the European legislator and case law to reduce barriers to the exercise of professions. Encouraged by investment in legal innovation, completely new players will enter the legal market in the coming years and decades.
This is to be seen as a great opportunity for the legal profession, as lawyers, by exploiting the potential of newer and more efficient digital technology, still have it in their own hands to play an important role in the legal market of the future.
Lawyers and other specialists in the legal market will only find appropriate answers to these developments if they start now to develop a better understanding of digital technologies.
This was precisely the motivation for organizing an annual congress fair on legal innovation and legal technology.
The LEGAL ®EVOLUTION brings together legal tech companies, law firms, legal departments, academics and policy makers at a Legal Tech Fair and Congress.
Thank you very much.
(Originally published on 03.10.2018 on the former CLP-Blog JurCoach)