IRIS today announced the availability of IRIS Law Scotland, a brand new, fresh and modern practice and case management system designed specifically for Scottish law. With over 200 Scottish legal firms already using IRIS solutions, IRIS has harnessed years of experience and feedback to create IRIS Law Scotland. As well as being designed specifically for Scottish legal professionals, IRIS Law Scotland is supported by a dedicated team based in IRIS’ Bridge of Allan office.
Brian Welsh, General Manager for IRIS Legal & Property in Scotland, said; “IRIS Law Scotland is designed to ensure that Scottish law firms can evolve to benefit from increasing changes in market conditions. It is a fully integrated modular solution capable of fulfilling the requirements of any practice irrespective of its size or speciality.”
IRIS Law Scotland is available as a complete solution or as a range of stand-alone case applications including wills and executry, conveyancing, personal injury and debt recovery. The solution minimises costs and maximises profitability through the efficient management of cases and the wider practice. IRIS Law Scotland is also available through a highly secure, hosted environment and presents a radically new way to access and pay for functionally rich software. Options are available for delivery on a ‘pay-as-you-go’ basis, perfect for smaller firms who would prefer to concentrate on their legal clients than managing an IT system. Prices for ‘pay-as-you-go’ start from £95 per user per month.
• IRIS Law Scotland is supplied by IRIS Legal & Property Solutions (Scotland), formerly GB Systems.
www.iris.co.uk/lawscotland
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Thursday, November 5
IRIS launch pay-as-you-go service for Scotland
by
Charles Christian
on Thu 05 Nov 2009 15:05 GMT
Bighand launch server side speech recognition
by
Charles Christian
on Thu 05 Nov 2009 15:00 GMT
At the company's EMEA user conference in London today, Bighand launched its new Server-based Speech Recognition module aimed at organisations looking to further streamline administrative overheads in the current climate, or support an upturn in work as the economy recovers. The new voice-to-text module also supports voice submission from Blackberrys and smartphones, alongside traditional dictation hardware. The Bighand server-side speech recognition add-on is part of the latest v3.3 release of Bighand’s digital dictation workflow software.
The speech recognition module (which utilises the Dragon NatuallySpeaking Speech Server from Nuance Communications) includes both a speech recognition only option, where the Transcription Server sends the resulting text back to the author, as well as a speech recognition with proofing option where the Transcription Server sends the resulting text to a secretary. The secretary performs any corrections, saves the document and then submits a copy of the corrected document. Once submitted the server-based speech file of the original author is upgraded, improving their results going forward. The author can still correct their own speech file if so desired. Moving the correction of the speech file to the secretary completely removes the time burden from the author and enables no change to their current working practices. As a result, even though there is minimal training, the author’s speech file continues to improve over time. In testing the Transcription Server returned a 233 word initial recording with 178 words correctly recognized (76.4%). After the first correction, the transcription server improved to recognise 226 of the words (97%), and by the third submission the server based system recognised 232 words (99.6%). The overall total cost of ownership of the new back-end or server-side speech recognition module is estimated to be as little as one third the cost of existing client-side/desktop speech recognition solutions. The module is licensed per user or per server, with minimal training required, no client-side installation and, subsequently, no loss of billable time. Additional features include Citrix & Terminal Services compatibility, document templates & bookmarks, acoustic modeling, vocabularies configured in Bighand System Administration, default and custom speaker profiles for different users of Bighand, and support for distributed Transcription Servers. Aside from the Server-side Speech Recognition module other new features within BigHand 3.3 include: • Document attachments & links within the workflow • New search engine & User Interface improvements • Support for Windows 7 & Windows Server 2008 R2 • 64-bit support extended to incorporate Terminal Client • Splitting of voice files & extended external sound file support • New & extended API for 3rd party developers Wednesday, November 4
Elite say 'we still dominate Big Law in the US'
by
Charles Christian
on Wed 04 Nov 2009 19:13 GMT
Elite has just released figures showing that a large majority of the AmLaw top 100 and 200 US law firms are customers of its financial and practice management software solutions. Based on the 2009 results, Elite customers account for 64% of the Top 50, 70% of the Top 100 and 65% of the Top 200. Elite add that their market share "is more than double that of its closest competitor." Elite also say "the market share looks the core financial systems installation. If they don’t use Elite for their primary finance and accounts systems, we don’t count them. Many vendor statistics muddle the data by counting a customer if they have any of a company’s products purchased or if a small acquired office still has their system. We believe that to be a misleading way to count the market share of the financial practice management applications. It’s always important to make this explicit clarification."
GlobalX becomes third NLIS licensed channel provider
by
Charles Christian
on Wed 04 Nov 2009 11:10 GMT
Land Data, the NLIS regulator, today announced a third NLIS channel license has been awarded. GlobalX Information Services (GlobalX), the largest provider of electronic land and property searches to the Australian legal community, has been granted the license and joins existing channels SearchFlow and Thames Water in providing authoritative electronic land and property search information through NLIS, to the conveyancing profession.
GlobalX has been providing online access to title searching and other land and property search services for conveyancers via its GXS.com.au portal since 1995. The company also offers a broad range of commercial information products as well as owning one of the largest legal practice management software solutions in Australia. Last month the NLIS Hub reduced its transactional fees to channels by 50%. This cost saving will be passed on to conveyancers making the benefits of ordering an electronic search through NLIS even more attractive. GlobalX Managing Director, Cameron Beavis is pleased with the company being granted an NLIS channel license. “The granting of an NLIS channel license offers GlobalX a dual opportunity. Firstly it provides GlobalX’s UK operations with immediate access to the broad range of the information products it requires to compete effectively in the UK market without the need for a large fulfillment team on the ground. Secondly, it provides a single source of UK information to deliver to our existing Australian customers in support of our anti-money laundering and international information strategies. • GlobalX Information Services commenced operations in Australia in 1995 and was the first information services company to deliver electronic land titles to the Australian market. Since then, GlobalX has developed a broad range of information products servicing a wide variety of corporate customers in the legal, commercial and property sectors. GlobalX Information Services has offices in Brisbane and Sydney.
Latest smartphone trends
by
Charles Christian
on Wed 04 Nov 2009 09:05 GMT
For those of you considering developing apps for smartphone (Blackberry, Symbian etc) platforms, we've got some new data from Canalys comparing trends in Q3 2007, Q3 2008 & Q3 2009. As you can see, over the 2 year period both Symbian and Windows Mobile have lost about one-third of their market share, Blackbery has doubled its share and the Apple iPhone's share has rocketed by more than we can work out this early in the morning.
Workshare launch Powerpoint comparison software - updated
by
Charles Christian
on Wed 04 Nov 2009 07:52 GMT
If you belief Microsoft Powerpoint is the spawn of the devil, then don't read on. If you believe it does have a valuable role to play then this new product launch by Workshare should be of interest...
Workshare today introduced Workshare Compare for PowerPoint, software which allows for fast, flexible and easy comparisons of Microsoft PowerPoint presentations. For the first time, PowerPoint users have an easy and intuitive way to track and manage edits made in PowerPoint slides – whether it is changes made by collaborators and reviewers, or within various versions of a presentation made by one individual. Workshare Compare for PowerPoint provides PowerPoint users with an easy way to identify slides and slide elements that have been modified, deleted, or inserted. Users can initiate a comparison directly within the PowerPoint interface to identify changes to text, images, speaker notes, fonts, the slide master, and more. Whether comparing and identifying the differences in small presentations or those with 1000+ slides, Workshare Compare for PowerPoint provides ease of use and flexibility with multiple slide views, custom comparison themes, and reporting options that provide a complete history of changes. And after identifying the differences between presentations, Workshare Compare for PowerPoint enables users to easily combine slides from different versions into a single master presentation. Key features of Workshare Compare for PowerPoint which appeal to frequent presentation writers and reviewers include: • fast and accurate presentation comparison for slide decks • ability to manage changes and save as a new Microsoft PowerPoint presentation • use of colour-coding to enable users to easily locate changes • display of source presentations as well as change summary in one view • efficient review of PowerPoint slides, incorporating content from previous versions or edits provided by colleagues • multiple options for comparing elements within slides and is easily configurable for colours and effects • comparisons for slide moves, insertions and deletions; text and/or image changes; speaker note changes; textbox and hyperlink changes Workshare Compare for PowerPoint is available now and a 14-day trial can be downloaded directly from www.workshare.com Pricing is subscription based at £110.00 per year – and here's a screenshot... Update: We've since learned that "Partner and direct customers are eligible for special pricing promotions if they purchased full Workshare Professional prior to Nov 3, 2009, as long as they were current with support and did not purchase their licenses online. If a customer needs clarification on eligibility, they should contact their Sales Representative." Which roughly translated means that if you have 20+ licences on support, you get Compare for PowerPoint free as a thank-you for customer loyalty.  Tuesday, November 3
Lloyds banking group to move into legal process outsourcing?
by
Charles Christian
on Tue 03 Nov 2009 08:50 GMT
This story first appeared on Rees Morrison's excellent Law Department Management Blog yesterday and is by guest author Bob Unterberger - www.lawdepartmentmanagementblog.com
...The UK financial giant Lloyds Bank is close to buying CPA Global, one of India's largest LPOs. The New York Times reports that Lloyd's will purchase CPA Global for about $700M. Neither Lloyds or CPA Global have confirmed a final deal. The Lloyds-CPA Global deal occurs just as there's an LPO industry shakeout. The smaller uncompetitive "mom and pop" LPOs are closing down. Many boutique LPOs, generally specializing in only one or two practice areas, failed to find the sweet spot. Some of India's larger Business Process Outsourcing companies (eg call center providers) have shuttered their LPOs out of fear of providing poor legal services to current clients (and killing the relationship) or frustrated that the legal "cycle" doesn't provide the immediate returns that BPO does. Or both. Finally, a handful of India's larger stand-alone LPOs are fighting for outside funding, and many are losing the battle. It's worth noting that the Lloyds-CPA Global deal puts an actual value on LPO. LPO numbers are dominated by misleading industry reports. The shake up has led to deals like Lloyd's-CPA Global. Next, look for India's BPO global giants to take on legal services in a big way, having learned the lessons of those smaller players who dove into the pool first... • Orange Rag Comment: Given that Lloyds is in the middle of some totally incomprehensible UK government prompted restructuring following the RBS and Northern Rock bailouts, anything is possible. We like the comment about "mom & pop" LPOs as, by coincidence, yesterday the Rag was contacted by PRs acting for three one-man-&-a-dog LPOs we'd never previously heard of, all trying to pitch us stories and get a mention on our hallowed pages – prompting us to wonder whether there are now more companies offering LPO services that there are law firms using them. CPA Global is one of the largest players in this market and its European staffers include Derk Kropholler (ex Aderant) and Jason Hulme (ex Informa). Monday, November 2
Firm says SaaS option cuts costs by 80%
by
Charles Christian
on Mon 02 Nov 2009 13:07 GMT
Bath-based Virtual Practices, which delivers SOS Connect case and practice management software as a service (SaaS) to law firms, has added Scottish cash management to its outsourced legal cashiering service. Glasgow-based Cameron Macaulay Solicitors is the first Scottish law firm to subscribe.
Following a sabbatical from the business and time for reflecting upon the best way for a lawyer to survive and prosper in the modern, post-Legal Services (Scotland) Act market, managing partner Malcolm Cameron has set up his new operation to rely on outsourced services as far as possible, including IT. An independent evaluation of software as a service (SaaS) suppliers of legal software led Mr Cameron to Virtual Practices from a short-list which also included IRIS and GB Systems (now also part of IRIS). Virtual Practices was established to give start-ups and smaller firms access to case and practice management software on a monthly subscription model. In addition, Virtual Practices offers an outsourced legal cashiering service which means that the small firm can avoid the costs of employing a legal cashier. Compliance with cash management reporting requirements in Scotland is more onerous than in England and changes were required to the software. Stephen Parry, business development director at Virtual Practices explained: ”The daily end of day reporting requirements in Scotland place stringent demands on law firms. Even the smallest practice would usually need to employ a legal cashier to ensure that the requirements are met. However due to the flexible, underlying architecture of SOS Connect, we were able to very rapidly add features which generate the reports automatically, effectively removing this administrative burden.” Malcolm Cameron commented: “The software as a service model also takes care of back-ups, business continuity and file storage and provides round the clock access, but the single most important benefit that makes this service exceptional is the legal cashiering. All I have to do is enter the credit and debit vouchers into the system and everything else transpires on time and completely accurately.” “Software as a service – or cloud computing – is no longer theoretical,” says Cameron. “The technology has reached a point where it is truly transformational in providing the smaller firm with a more profitable business model. I have saved around 25 hours a month which is now available for remunerative work and can organise the business around client service and quality. I have reduced overheads by over 80% and have the luxury of time to make service quality the cornerstone of my practice.”
Only one-in-four law firms make proper use of alumni networks
by
Charles Christian
on Mon 02 Nov 2009 10:00 GMT
Only one in four of the Top 100 UK law firms are making use of their alumni networks as part of their marketing reveals research by Sweet & Maxwell, the legal information provider.
Sweet & Maxwell found that just 26% of Top 100 law firms give details of their alumni network on their websites. Sweet & Maxwell says that although this is a marked increase on the just 15% of Top 100 law firms making use of alumni networks in 2006, it is still a low result for what is otherwise now such a marketing savvy sector. Sweet & Maxwell says that professional services firms increasingly see their alumni networks either as a direct source of new business or as a source for valuable referrals. McKinsey, one the world’s most respected professional services firms, is often referred to as treating its alumni as one of its most valuable assets. Sweet & Maxwell says that the smaller the law firm the less likely they are to properly tap into their alumni network. Whilst nine of the Top 10 law firms by turnover have an alumni page on their website this falls to just 19% of law firms ranked 11-100 and just only 10% of law firms ranked 51-100 by turnover. Competition amongst law firms for work is becoming increasingly fierce with ‘beauty parades’ in front of selection panels now the norm. Sweet & Maxwell says that alumni connections can give a firm the edge in this process by acting as informal diplomats for that firm. Sweet & Maxwell adds that keeping in contact with former members of staff has become much more important during the recession as law firms have made redundancies with those former employees moving into jobs at existing or potential clients. Sweet & Maxwell says that the idea that an employee that has been made redundant by a firm would in the future refer work to them may seem counterintuitive but it is actually relatively common. Sweet & Maxwell says that a well run alumni network can help build goodwill between a firm and its ex-employees. Whilst many of the largest commercial law firms have integrated their alumni networks into their marketing strategies many smaller firms seem some way from systematically mining this source of potential new business.
Another good month for Orange Rag visitor traffic
by
Charles Christian
on Mon 02 Nov 2009 09:00 GMT
October was another good month for Orange Rag visitor traffic, hitting a new record of 27,750 visitors (measured as distinct hosts served) and 540,000 page views. Thank you very much. (Although we are going to have to migrate to a new server to handle the volume!)
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