e.law is moving to take a more central role in ediscovery by offering document review services in Australia, offering to assist law firms struggling with the huge amount of unstructured data involved in litigation.

KPMG estimates that first level document review encompasses anywhere between 58% and 90% of total litigation costs. It can involve millions of documents that must be reviewed by teams of law firm associates, lawyers and paralegals.

Building on history as legal technology service provider within Asia Pacific, e.law will also now offer experienced document review lawyers that can look at a document and decide if it is privileged, relevant to the case and to what degree it is relevant.

This type of service is a major trend in the US and Europe, where contract document review providers do a low level first pass review before it gets handed over to the law firm.

Australia is now catching up with the size, scope and frequency of corporate litigation in those markets, so e.law is looking to move up the value chain for litigation support in the region, by adding the skills of its trained legal teams to the technical solutions if offers for ediscovery management.

Rebecca Grant, e.law’s Head of e.courts and General Counsel, said, “The ability to offer subjective document review is a natural progression for e.law and builds on the skills and services we already offer the market.

“The nature of legal outsourcing is changing and with clients placing greater focus on legal costs post GFC we see the demand for this service increasing dramatically.”

Allison Stanfield, CEO of e.law adds; ”We have always prided ourselves on being trailblazers in the industry and in offering a level of service and quality that goes beyond the standard litigation support model. As an incorporated legal firm with an unmatched pedigree in electronic litigation the benefits we can offer clients in conducting efficient and cost effective subjective document review are enormous.”

To learn more about this new service, e.law is offering an in-house educational seminar on 24th November, 6pm, Level 3, 9 Castlereagh Street, Sydney. More details can be found at elaw.com.au