There was a story
in The Times this week
about fundraising for fintech becoming harder. The numbers raised by start-ups does appear to be declining as the works stock markets take a battering arising from the heady mix of inflation, tight labour markets, post-pandemic supply chain problems, war in Ukraine and a generally uncertain economic outlook.
Against that background it is even more impressive that two UK legal market start-ups have successfully raised funds in recent weeks. amicable
have raised a further £1.2 m, nearly doubling the total raised since launching. Legl
have raised $18m
to fund further product investment and growth.
How have these two businesses – both of whom are my clients – succeed in fundraising in these unsettling financial times? Perhaps it is simply about having a good business with real growth prospects?
amicable offers couples a better way to separate or divorce, coaching them through the legal processes, financial disentanglement, and co-parenting challenges. It has grown consistently since launch and tis well positioned to take advantage of the shift to no fault divorce. In fact the media coverage it got when no fault divorce came in signifies just how much its approach resonates with journalists, and that editors think the public will agree. But amicable is much more than an alternative to expensive lawyers. Their use of technology and data helps them provide better client experiences, lower costs and better insights that drive product development. Their
co-parenting app
is one example.
amicable must be on to something. In the US a start-up (that I also work with) called
Hello Divorce!
is disrupting the US market for lawyers and divorce in the same way. There seems to be a wide appetite for making divorce a better experience and traditional law firms may need to respond quickly or find that the market has moved beyond them.
Legl offer SaaS products that help law firms with client on boarding, managing the client lifecycle, workflows, payments and due diligence. They use beautiful technology to turn something lawyers see as bureaucracy into a positive customer journey. Done well it helps law firms operate more efficiently, setting lawyers free to lawyer and giving clients a more positive sense of the law firm. The pandemic may have increased the number of firms open to technological solutions that work remotely but the service has to back that up and Legl is certainly doing that. Take a look at some of their webinars
to see how they use data to provide insights to firms that back up the surface experience of the software.
So a good business is a prerequisite for investment. And it seems to me that smart use of data must be part of that. Law is not good at data and that is something that
LawTech Uk
led by Jenifer Swallow has been focused upon. It is increasingly clear that law firms need to up their game on data if they are to move into the digital world. That amicable and Legl are data enabled businesses is part of their success. For amicable it helps set them apart from law firms, whereas Legl are offering a data capability, or at least data insights, to law firms that traditionally have not had them.
I heard recently that one major professional services business employed something like 4,500 data scientists. Most law firms don’t have any. The Digital Legal Exchange, where I am a faculty member, has been thinking about data as part of the transformation of law. Data driven insights are part of many other start-ups service across the legal industry but it remains far behind other sectors I fear.
So amicable and Legl show that the opportunities for investment are still positive for great businesses, perhaps underpinned by good technology and data insights. However, I don’t think that is enough for a start-up to raise funding successfully. To me the key ingredient is great leaders. And amicable and Legl really do have that.
Julia Salasky (Legl) and Pip Wilson & Kate Daly (amicable) really are impressive female founders. They are building great businesses that are already meeting customers’ needs, growing and attracting significant investment. The future is bright for them whatever the current investment background. It is an honour to work with them.
