Empowering firms to be future-ready
In conversation with Dev Chopra, managing director of Flosmart Solutions, on how the legal technology company enables law firms to be cost effective and improve efficiency.
How did Flosmart Solutions get started, and what has been your experience in the legal technology space?
Flosmart Solutions was founded by me, a finance professional from the UK, and Rupali Gill, a UK qualified solicitor from London.
When we moved to the UAE from London in 2014, we identified a real gap in the market for local legal support services such as document scanning, bundle preparation, and printing. With the increasing use of technology in legal matters we identified other technology gaps in the legal process – mainly, expensive eDiscovery services, lack of local providers for eBundle platforms, and limited options for transcription services.
Over the past five years, we have rapidly expanded our legal technology solutions offerings to include document scanning, eDiscovery, case preparation, electronic bundle preparation, arbitration hearing services and legal bundle printing to fill these gaps.
The use of technology is an increasing trend in the legal sector. Can you expand on how the use of specific technologies can benefit law firms?
Document scanning services allow law firms to convert hardcopy documents into digital format, making them easier to access and review.
Our eDiscovery services help law firms to efficiently process large amounts of electronic data at a fraction of the cost of traditional eDiscovery methods.
Case preparation platforms provide a centralised location for all case-related documents and communication and reduce the need for printing hardcopy bundles. They facilitate easy collaboration between teams and parties thereby increasing overall efficiency.
Outsourcing electronic bundle preparation services including indexing, document renaming, pagination, and OCR can save associates and paralegals from spending their valuable time on document handling.
All of our services are specifically tailored to help law firms reduce costs and increase their efficiency. In fact, several law firms currently involve Flosmart during their pitches to potential clients to showcase how the use of our technology can help save costs in the long run.
There has been an upward trend in arbitration hearings in the region over the past few years. Are there any specific services Flosmart offers in this space?
For arbitration hearings, we provide a complete service, including data hosting, electronic presentation of evidence, transcription, and hearing room setup. We can even facilitate virtual hearings, which have become increasingly important post-pandemic.
Even today, we encourage our clients to conduct their hearings virtually or have a hybrid hearing where witnesses and experts can attend remotely.
We undertook a study on costs and found that a virtual hearing can save almost 57% in costs compared to a fully in-person hearing. And for the more environmentally conscious, it also provides a reduction in the overall carbon footprint of the Arbitration hearing.
That’s an interesting point that seems to be trending of late – Greener Arbitrations. What are your thoughts on that?
The very essence of our business started from document digitisation to reduce the use of paper in legal matters. However, we have still found the use of hard copy legal bundles as a requirement of quite a few firms. To offset this, as part of our CSR, we have partnered with tree-nation.com, where companies can be involved in planting trees all around the world and offset their CO2 emissions. For example, in April of this year, we planted enough trees to offset 80,000 kgs of CO2.
Over the years, every technology that we have adopted has been one step towards that goal. The use of our eBundle platform is probably one of the biggest factors in allowing firms to reduce the amount of paper they generate and also allow users to collaborate without the hassle of travel and sharing hardcopy documents. We encourage our clients to undertake virtual hearings as much as possible and even when that is not the case, our real-time transcription services are provided remotely – saving on travel costs and Co2 emissions.
What is next for Flosmart Solutions?
Flosmart Solutions is the only company in the Middle East that provides all the services that a law firm may need from the inception right to the conclusion of a legal matter, in essence forming the only “one-stop shop” for legal support services. Our focus is on providing a complete solution for law firms, from eDiscovery, Case management, and Transcription service to Hearing Management.
We now have a presence in London to service growing demand in the UK and Europe. We are also garnering interest from firms in Singapore and Hong Kong and have recently appointed a regional director for Southeast Asia.
