Greg Shriber, director of Product & Community Strategy at Thomson Reuters, took some time during the Serengeti Summit to share how Serengeti Tracker offers customers the ability to compare their information and analyze trends over time within their organization. He also discussed how users of Serengeti Tracker now have the opportunity to compare themselves with peer groups in the marketplace.

For additional information on Serengeti Tracker, Serengeti Intelligence or to see the products at work, visit serengetilaw.com.

The result is often higher productivity for the firm, and lower costs for the client, creating a win-win situation that strengthens the firm-client relationship and can result in more business for the firm.

In a recent post on the ABA’s Legal Rebels blog, Allison Guidette,  senior vp and general manager, Large Law Firm Segment, discusses how technology can help firms achieve greater efficiency.

Houston-based attorney Tim Johnson, a technology enthusiast, uses mobile solutions to improve his work efficiency while on the go and, his clients are seeing the results. Johnson, among other legal professionals, believes that mobile technology offers efficiencies that benefit both the client and the firm.   

Read how Johnson employs technology here.

How do you use mobile technology to improve efficiencies in your practice?

Thomson Reuters sponsorship is fitting because the rule of law, articulated so effectively in the U.S. Constitution, is at the heart of the work we do here every day.

“As part of our daily work, we get to see that these documents – the U.S. Constitution and its Bill of Rights – are not only historically important, but as alive today as they were at the time of these early printings,” said Mike Suchsland, president of the Legal business of Thomson Reuters at the unveiling reception for the exhibit. “According to Westlaw, in the first three months of this year, there were more than 600 decisions issued in federal courts involving the First Amendment alone,” said Suchsland.  

To learn more about this exhibit, visit “We the People:  The First Official Printing of the U.S. Constitution.” Or better yet, if you’re in the neighborhood you can stop by the Minnesota History Center and see it in person.

January has long been perceived as “Divorce Month.”  However, Findlaw.com recently released study results that showed searches for “divorce” and related phrases such as “family law” and “child custody” jumped 50 percent – from December 2010 to January 2011, and continued to surge through March 2011. An analysis of divorce filings using Westlaw revealed that filings in the U.S. consistently spike in January each year, but continue to rise in February and peak in March.

“While people may have been thinking about divorce for some time, and taking steps such as obtaining marital counseling, many men and women may put off the decision to file for divorce to avoid additional holiday season stress,” says Mark Ohnstad, a family law attorney with Minneapolis firm Thomson Nybeck. “And, couples with children may want to have one last holiday season together as a family.”

On Day Three of LegalTech, I discussed the show’s themes with a long-standing client. She mentioned some of the latest tools, but came back to the basics of project management. I said, aha! The process side is winning out. Nope, the client said, that’s too easy. And she was right. The tools, even the latest triangle graphs, attempt to present themselves as a tool to facilitate process. I need to chew on this one a bit further, but here’s my initial take on this epiphany.
So what are the “right” types of tools that appeared to resonate this year? Maybe we’re talking about the ones that most efficiently bridge the data/process gap. A discovery platform that provides as much value with small data sets as large. Research tools that more accurately find the most relevant cases. Ecosystems of tools that individually solve specific problems and together track data/documents through a process. The ability to eliminate rummaging through piles of books, contracts and/or transcripts to insert the right quote with accurate citations. Each solves a practical process problem, but has better reach into the data.

It’s like the old adage: if your tool is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.

Don’t get me wrong. I still carry my bias, but maybe I’ll put down the hammer and pick up a wrench every now and again.

Legal Current caught up with Ari for a chat about his LegalTech NY panel discussion “Advice from Counsel: Top Legal Minds in the Country Share their eDiscovery Tips.”

Attendees of the Thomson Reuters Technology Conference 2012 enjoyed one of many sessions.

In early January, the company hosted an internal technology conference drawing nearly 1,000 employees. The external technology conference was hosted about a week later and around 300 technologists spent the day on the Eagan campus.

Attendees were offered numerous sessions that included such topics as mobile web versus mobile apps, the cloud, collaboration, Android versus iOS development, and more. During the internal conference, James Powell, chief technology officer for Thomson Reuters, gave the keynote address about the central role of technology at Thomson Reuters.

At the external conference, attendees received a keynote address from Carolyn Parnell, chief information officer for the State of Minnesota. She discussed the issues facing the state surrounding consolidation and virtualization of the IT function, as well as how innovation is needed to succeed.

The panels featured leading technologists from Thomson Reuters, including Bob Schukai, Dan Bennett, Brian Quinn and Dr. Khalid Al-Kofahi. Other notable presenters included: Dr. Abhishek Chandra, University of Minnesota; Chris Derner, Informatica; John R. Fox, SWAT Solutions; and Dr. Jamshid Vayghan, IBM.

During each conference, Thomson Reuters hosted a coding competition where attendees could test their skills against their peers and win some great prizes.

“Intellectual property is the bridge that connects innovation with economic growth,” said David Brown, president of the IP Solutions business of Thomson Reuters. “We’ve taken on this research as a means of identifying the point where innovation and creativity meet marketability, thus setting the stage for sustained economic development. By closely examining a wide variety of metrics, we can see China is clearly on that path, but there are significant milestones yet to be attained.” 

Among the key findings detailed in the free Thomson Reuters China reports on patent and trademark trends: 

• China Now Leads World in Patent Filings: Published patent applications in China increased by 16.7 percent between 2006 and 2010; and this year’s patent activity secures China’s status as the world leader in patent application volume, as previously predicted by Thomson Reuters. Thomson Reuters projects that China will publish 493,000 patent applications annually by 2015.
   
• Trademark Applications Surge: Since 2000, the number of trademarks registered in China has increased by more than 450 percent, far outpacing other nations, despite widespread counterfeiting and infringement.
   
• Growing Influence in Scientific Literature: Over the last five years, there has been an 80 percent increase in Chinese scientific literature annual output, making China second in the world in published scientific papers. The United States, which currently has the highest overall output, grew by five percent. 
   
• Slow to Expand Globally: Chinese organizations are not protecting their inventions by filing patents globally at the same level as other innovation-minded countries. Currently, only 5.6 percent of China’s inventions are protected with global patent filings abroad, far less than the United States (48.8 percent) and Japan (38.7 percent). 
   
• China’s Corporate Innovation Lags: According to the Thomson Reuters Top 100 Global Innovators analysis, the most innovative companies in the world are based in the United States (40 percent), Europe (29 percent) and Japan (27 percent).
   
• Global Brands Capitalize on Chinese Consumerism: In an economic environment that is expected to reach $4.3 trillion USD in retail spending by 2015, leading multinational companies have been among the top 20 trademark filers in China from 1976 through 2011.   

The research findings are available in two new reports from the IP Solutions business of Thomson Reuters.  Invented in China assesses total patent volumes and highlights growing areas of innovation activity in China.  Special Report: Trademarks in China tracks trends in trademark activity in China over the last 20 years and analyzes trademark activities of the world’s leading brands.