AI and digital transformation in the legal industry

The legal industry is experiencing a rapid digital and artificial intelligence transformation. This shift is characterized by high adoption rates, with data indicating that 71% of solo practitioners and 87% of professionals at large firms have integrated AI into their workflows.

This evolution follows significant increases in cloud infrastructure adoption and the remote work requirements necessitated by the pandemic. The industry is moving toward an ‘AI-native landscape’ where firms are increasingly utilizing technologies like vectorization and Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) to integrate semantic meaning into Large Language Models (LLMs), aiming to reduce hallucinations and ensure accurate citations.

Newer business models are emerging to meet these technological shifts. For example, the Amsterdam-based firm Driven Lawyers has launched as an ‘AI-native’ entity, utilizing proprietary software to anchor legal claims to verifiable sources. Meanwhile, larger firms like Kirkland & Ellis are investing heavily in building an ‘ontology’ to digitize institutional memory, creating unique, reasoning-capable AI layers rather than relying solely on public data tools.