Merger and Acquisitions are in inherently complex transaction, often involving investments running into millions of dollars. To ensure complete details of the transaction are taken care of and no critical detail is overlooked, legal professionals involving lawyers and paralegals are increasingly turning to AI as a tool of precision on efficiency. This very resilience gives arise to the fundamental question i.e., Is AI a genuine boon for the legal fraternity or does it carry a hidden challenges that warrant closure scrutiny. The integration of technology into our daily lives has enhanced connectivity and has enlarged access to knowledge in varieties of field. However, this hyper interdependence has, in certain respects, limited our scope of natural learning and adaptability.
Benefits of AI
Automated Proofreading and Editing
A very crucial part of a lawyer’s life includes proofreading and making sure that all drafts and documents are true to its actual sense. AI helps herein for removing in any kind of inconsistencies in respect to grammar, words, and other styles in a document, further, it substantially reduces time spent on hours spent for manual searches to find errors and increases efficiency and quality by using the apt words allowing the budding associates to furnish their understanding on a piece of paper in the right professional sense.
Contract Review and Due Diligence Review
With Clients using AI and getting to the “know-how” of the transaction and drafting of agreements even before consulting the lawyer, AI support associates in flagging issues with the help of a contract review tool. The tool can increase the efficiency of the draft upto 40% given the same is done in collaboration of a human brain.
Documentation Management
AI can be efficiently used to manage all the bulky documentation ensuring quality and consistency assurance. This helps lawyers on working on more complex ideas and focus on complexities along with contract negotiations and overall strategy.
E-Discovery & Litigation Services
E-discovery is a digital process of storing, preserving, collecting, reviewing and producing Electronically Stored Information for litigation and further investigation. It is a multi-dollar market heavly dominated by AI and Cloud automation to manage massive, unstructured datasets. E-discoveries services can be further beneficial to review matters from end to end, track deals points from prior deals, lease abstractions, statistics and reporting, contract drafting and redlining etc.,
While LegalTech undoubtedly delivers significant efficiency gains and cost savings, it also presents inherent disadvantages that may adversely affect the integrity of the client attorney relationship.
Data Security
There exists a significant risk of confidentiality breaches, encompassing sensitive client details such as names, proposed transactions, cost associated etc., which may in turn precipitate cybersecurity incidents. In recognition of these concerns, India has enacted the Digital Personal Data Protection 2023 (“DPDP”), implementing its provisions in a phased and structured manner to ddress the escalating challenges of data security.
Generic Drafting
It is imperative that use of AI in legal drafting be paired with mindfulness and discernment of a lawyer. While AI is capable of generating generic, universal templates, the tailoring of such drafts to the specific needs of a client remains a function that only human judgement can accomplish. In effect, the precision of the prompt and the vigilance exercised in ensuring that the output reflects the essence of the matter at hand are critical. The lawyer’s role lies not merely in prompting the system but in redefining and contextualizing its output so that the drafting is both timely and client-centric.
Resistance to Change
A significant number of lawfirms continue to accord primacy to traditional methods of legal practice, including research, drafting, client engagement and document management with a marked preference for paper based systems over technology driven models.
Operational Challenges
Legal tech platforms often require specialized training. Lawyers and support staff, already having bandwidth, may perceive training as an additional workload. Inadequate training may lead to underutilization, frustration and errors in applications. Firms hence, must institutionalize structured training programs with measurable outcomes.
