Early Industry Adopters: Law Firms in the Digital Marketplace

When we look at the advantages we gain by migrating our intellectual properties from the physical paper world to the Digital Marketplace, it is hard to find better cost savings, return-on-investment, and increased business operational and end-user efficiencies, than those realized by early adopters: academic institutions, government agencies and law firms.  

According to the American Bar Association (ABA), there are 1.1 million licensed attorneys, and 191 ABA-approved law schools in the United States. 74% of all attorneys end up working in private practice, or law firms. In 2000, there were 47,563 legal practice groups or law firms in the United States.

By sheer volume alone, it is clear how critical legal research is to these attorneys, firms, and their million clients each year.  Firms spend countless hours accessing, researching, reading, and citing thousands of legal documents and laws on a daily basis, including: Constitutional, contract, trust, criminal, civil, property, administrative and international law. Digitization of our American laws has dramatically reduced research time for law professional and government agencies, resulting in increased service, time, and savings in operational efficiencies to their bottom lines.

According to the National Center for State Courts (NCSC), U.S. citizens filed over 1 million new lawsuits in state courts in 2003 (54.7% involving traffic matters, 20.6 involving criminal laws).  This growing need and trend of virtual access to our many laws through the Digital Marketplace is rapidly changing the American legal market for the 1.1 million attorneys, 47,563 firms, and the 213,000,000 Americans who can now conduct online research and due diligence on their own, as well. 

LAC Group partners with more than 80 of the AMLAW 200 firms, as well as firms in Canada and the UK to provide digitization, on-demand research, staffing, outsourcing or managed services and expense reduction services.

"In my work a good library is essential. It enables me to learn the background and previous discussions of the various issues I am called upon to decide. It provides the stability and continuity for the rule of law." - Sandra Day O Connor, the first female member of the Supreme Court of the United States.

Blog Reference:
HG.org, Worldwide Legal Directories: Overview of the Legal Market