Category Archives for "Feit Consulting"

Goodbye Relationship, Hello Transaction?

By Michael Feit | Feit Consulting

As we prepared our 2019 Legal Information Vendor Market Survey questions, we realized a lot had changed in the market since our last Survey.

Multiple vendors had made aggressive moves to take more market share – and seemed to have left customer relationships at the side of the road.

It left us with the question, are legal information vendors operating on a new premise: “Goodbye relationship, hello transaction”?  It may not be all that surprising behavior in a saturated market with vendors, but it’s good to understand the tactics of the major players and how firms across the industry are responding.

Here are some of the questions we had on our minds as we developed the survey:

• Is sole provider morphing into churn – delete a vendor, bring the vendor back at a lower cost?
• Will Lexis be successful with its restrictive policy, and how important to firms are their peripheral products to underpin this strategy?
• How has the market sentiment regarding Bloomberg BNA changed with the sunsetting of key print and other products?
• How do customer’s feel about the forced upgrades in Bloomberg BNA proposals?
• How likely are firms to purchase Westlaw Edge? And what are they willing to pay?
• What are the 2019 must-have products?

In the end, the outcome may resemble what has transpired in other similar markets. Alternatives and new competitors will spring up. Customers will be on the alert to seek out more reasonably-priced options.  And when the pain of these price increases – and presumably, additional increases to come – becomes too great to bear, firms may simply begin to walk away.

We look forward to what the data will show.

How to Not be Hostage to Your Vendor

By Michael Feit | Feit Consulting

By Michael Feit

The recently deployed pricing tactic by Lexis only served to add more heat to an already vigorous debate regarding the viability successfully operating with just Lexis or just Westlaw.  For the first time since the early 1990’s, retaining just one of these vendors has become the norm with 54% of large law firms having opted to retain only one vendor–and about 60% of those choosing Westlaw.

A vital takeaway from the current debate on pricing tactics is that no firm should be hostage to their vendor.  Well-established customers are, on average, treated the worst by their providers and receive the most unfavorable terms and conditions.  New technologies, including AI-based platforms, will continue to erode the consumption-based model, and for a host of other reasons, firms should place themselves in a position of having options.

In a perfect world, Lexis and Westlaw would publish retail pricing, and firms could pick and choose which products they wanted based on their practice needs and budget.  This ideal world does not exist today, as both vendors have discontinued standardized pay-as-you-go retail pricing. Instead all they offer is secret pricing and terms that vary greatly from firm to firm.

The good news is, there are options! You don’t need to be a hostage to your vendor if you have enough time to evaluate the options. The evaluation process in itself can prove fruitful, sharing pertinent information that can be used in the negotiation process.

There are a great number of elements to examine, from contracts to content, not to mention the strong reactions of users to fundamental system changes. Lexis and Westlaw have both successfully infiltrated law firms’ cultures and infrastructures over their many years of service.

The idea of transitioning to sole provider can be daunting, however, considering the many individuals and processes that might be impacted. There are a great number of elements to examine, from contracts to content, not to mention the strong reactions of users to fundamental system changes.  Lexis and Westlaw have both successfully infiltrated law firms’ cultures and infrastructures over their many years of service.

Yet, the pay-off in taking a deep look at these factors can be exceptional.  A mid-size US law firm with favorable pricing will spend well over half a million dollars annually to retain both vendors.  There was a time not long ago when firms could pass through online legal information costs to clients, making Lexis and Westlaw essentially free.  That is no longer the norm.  We have entered into a new paradigm.

Where to start:

• Get the pricing intel to determine your pricing is favorable. Compare contracts with market intel in Feit’s white paper, Optimizing Legal Information Pricing.
• Assess the viability of the sole-provider option. Evaluate the option at your organization. Develop a business case. If needed, check out this resource, The Sole Provider Playbook.
• Execute and implement. Consider hiring a consultant to manage the process.
• Exploring the sole-provider option is a healthy step in revising your legal-information strategy and can provide insightful information for contract negotiations. If you choose to do it alone, these resources are an advantage to legal-information decision makers on what steps and considerations should be made in the process.

Solve the Communication Gap, Show ROI, Evolve Your Firm’s Library

By Michael Feit | Feit Consulting

Law firms are now metrics-driven organizations.  A modern library, therefore, must yield a demonstrable return on investment.  To do so, information professionals need to expand their services and role within the firm to meet and lead new and rapidly changing needs, deliver enhanced value to changing stakeholders within the firm, and now also capture the relevant data that will demonstrate all that value back to firm leadership.   

This evolution requires individuals working in and with the library to have an open mind of how the skills of the law librarian team can be optimized, allowing for information professionals to find innovative ways to add value, including: collaborating with new departments within the firm, utilize metrics to showcase value and articulate ROI, and leveraging technology to improve the delivery of information. 

Feit Consulting surveyed librarians, administrators and legal information specialists to assess the current status of law libraries and better understand, confirm or dispel the issues surrounding the move towards modernization.  We found, however, a common theme amongst administrators interviewed in our research as, “I don’t know what I don’t know. I rely on my librarian to tell me.”

This sentiment is reflected in our survey in which a significant 50% of respondents indicated that the person they report to either “slightly understands” or “does not understand” the role of the library, revealing a serious disconnect.  

This communication gap is not going to serve as the foundation for the evolution library professionals need to facilitate and it needs to change.  Even more challenging, only 37% of respondents indicated the library’s strategies are derived from the firm’s larger strategic plan as illustrated below.

To address these issues, Feit Consulting has developed detailed roadmap to help information professionals solve these communication gaps and evolve the modern library, Beyond Virtualization:  Transforming the Law Library.  You can see a preview of Beyond Virtualization:  Transforming the Law Library here.  The comprehensive white paper is also available for purchase or let’s discuss your firm’s specific needs.  Contact us at info@feitconsulting.com.

Sole Provider Adoption Trends: Key Data

By Michael Feit | Feit Consulting

Imagine if Lexis and Westlaw were new products today, offering your firm the same subscription price you already have. Would you really purchase both? Most of those informed on the topic would argue that these products are far too close in total content to need both. This duopoly paradigm has been in place since the early 90s and has been the norm since until recently.

Historically, firms could retain both Lexis and Westlaw because the majority of costs would be passed through to clients. The recession forever changed the dynamics of the online legal information market for both vendors and firms. Firms started to see their sophisticated corporate clients closely scrutinizing costs and refusing to pay for online legal research. Now that recovery rates have greatly diminished, firms are being forced to evaluate their need to retain both vendors.

Feit Consulting collected data on 389 law firms with over 100 attorneys in the US within the last year those firms provided relevant, decision-making insight on adoption trends, including this key data point: for the first time since the 90’s, the sole provider option has become the norm at most firms. See the charts below:

The historic growth of the sole provider trend amongst firms in the Am Law 200/100 has been growing rapidly from the early 2000s to today.  As a greater number firms continue to move in this direction, the validity and viability of this option has been reinforced.

For U.S. Law Firm email addresses only:

Curious for more?  Email Feit Consulting here to see how the sole provider trend breaks down by Westlaw and Lexis.

At AALL: Westlaw Edge Introduction

By Michael Feit | Feit Consulting

Thomson highlighted five major components that set Westlaw Edge apart from its predecessor, Westlaw Next:

• Enhanced search capabilities, with a new algorithm (WestSearch Plus) that looks beyond terms and at metadata and case citing relationships for more responsive search and a predictive question asking system.

• Warnings for invalid or questionable law, which flags both bad, outdated law and risks for overruling, even on cases that are not directly cited by a new case that changes the law.

• A tool for statutory change analysis, allowing comparison between versions of statutes and highlighting added and deleted language, similar to Microsoft Word’s tracked changes.

• Integrated litigation analytics, which employs machine learning and the company’s stable of legal editors to break down state and federal dockets for analysis by attributes like judges, motions, attorneys and more.

• “User Experience improvements,” such as synopsis-like case backgrounds, holdings, and more.

The new features are interesting/exciting but it’s not likely to come with a substantial upcharge. As you may recall in the introduction of Westlaw Next in 2010, the new platform was offered initially as a monthly upcharge. Eventually, (5 years plus) all hold-outs were moved to the new platform with no cost as Westlaw.com was sunsetted.

In its release of Westlaw, Thomson Reuters analysis showed that complex legal research tasks take an average of six hours, with some taking much longer. AI-driven platforms should reduce the time for searches and should improve the quality of the results. Firms want to be in an a flexible/nimble position to adapt to the rapid pace of change.

At AALL: Here Are Your 5 To Do’s

By Michael Feit | Feit Consulting

LexisNexis and Westlaw will, of course, dominate discussions at AALL this year as they have in years past.  With the recent pricing tactics taken on by Lexis (see Michael Feit’s take on this in Legaltech News here), and the big announcement from Thomson Reuters’ introduction of Westlaw Edge, there’s a lot to talk about.  Here are our 5 things to do to make the most out of your time in Baltimore:

Do:  Learn as much as possible about the AI releases and features.

There’s so much buzz around AI, it is difficult at times to separate the hype from the application.  AI is coming to library services and so we should all be learning as much as possible about its true potential. It is not surprising to see Westlaw finally get into the AI arena with the release of Westlaw Edge.  AI features will continue to erode consumption, and so the onus is on the provider to build those features into the platform to make them more valuable.

Do:  Learn as much as possible about the features of Westlaw Edge.

Do:  Learn more about the changes to BBNA platform and management.

Do:  Find out what your peers are thinking about the Lexis bundling tactics and the AALL’s inability to move them away from their position, despite the outcry.

Do:  Vendors such as Westlaw and Lexis are re-selling surveillance data to ICE and other government agencies.  Ask your vendor do you use our Firm’s legal search user data in their surveillance search platforms?

BONUS: Do NOT miss:  John Waters’ keynote address, we’re sure it will be fantastic and fun.