Australian startup wins for legal innovation
Envato's in-house team was the only non-law firm to be included in the organisational category of the awards
By Envato
The Envato legal team – Chaman Sidhu, Peter Tsipas and Sarah Davoren – have won the Organisational category in the 2015 Legal Innovation Index, awarded by LexisNexis® Pacific and Janders Dean.
Envato’s three-person, in-house legal team was the only non-law firm to be included in the organisational category of the awards. They were recognised for their agile working practices, and natural language approach to making complex legal concepts accessible for their millions of users.
“It’s fantastic to see innovation in the legal arena being fostered through the Legal Innovation Index,” said Envato Legal Director Chaman Sidhu, who accepted the award at a ceremony in Sydney last night.
“We’re honoured to have received an award as a small in-house legal team. It shows what a team of any size can do.
“We aim to support Envato’s leading-edge products and sites through our own innovation in the legal team. The judges noted our approach to ‘minimum viable product’ legal solutions for an MVP product launch, our natural language approach to making legal terms understandable to millions of site users, and our agile workflow philosophies.”
2015 Legal Innovation Index judge, Dr George Beaton of Beaton Capital, said this year’s entries are at a world-class level.
“The legal services ecosystem in Australia is at last showing signs of emerging technology and business model-based innovation,” he said.
“This applies to both B2B and B2C providers as well the in-house demand side. This year’s entries are of the highest order, many rivalling what I am seeing in the UK and North America”.
“2015 is the year of the democratisation of the legal process in Australia,” said Justin North, Director, Janders Dean.
“We have seen so many exciting projects that demystify and provide better access to legal service for clients in a more affordable way.”
The panel of judges included: Professor Michael Adams, UWS; Josh Kubicki, Legal Transformation Institute, Michigan State University; Joanna Goodman, Law Society Gazette; Richard Burcher, Validatum; George Beaton, Beaton Capital; Laura Vickers, Nest Legal; John Humphrey, QUT Law School; Denise Farmer (LexisNexis) and Justin North (Janders Dean).
“We have already had more than one law firm show how they’re ready to start innovating with us after we were announced as a finalist, which is a great example of how ideas can spread through initiatives like this award,” said Chaman Sidhu.
For more on the awards and finalists, visit http://lexisnexis.com.au/legal-innovation-index/index.html.
