Further to our blog on ChatGPT published at the end of last month , Allen & Overy, one of the world’s leading international law firms, has revealed this week that they have adopted a new ChatGPT-style legal AI tool called Harvey.

You may be thinking: Why does ‘Harvey’ and the law ring a bell? This is most likely due to the hit US television series ‘Suits’ and one of its lead characters ‘Harvey Specter – the best closer in New York City’. Although this is yet to be confirmed, Harvey was created by a team of US former lawyers and programmers so it is a possibility that the fictional lawyer was the inspiration behind the name.

Regardless of the name, Harvey has been described by David Wakeling, the head of Allen & Overy’s markets innovation group, as a “game-changer that can unleash the power of generative AI to transform the legal industry”.

Last November, the creators of Harvey received funding from the OpenAI Startup Fund, the company behind ChatGPT. They have been trialling Harvey internally since then and, following its success, have decided to now announce its existence to the world, along with their partnership with Allen & Overy.

Where ChatGPT is a global AI project intended to be used for multiple industries and the public at large, Harvey’s application appears to cater for the legal industry specifically. One of the co-founders, Gabriel Pereya, noted that the aim of Harvey is to serve as an intermediary between lawyers and tech as a “natural language interface to the law” not to replace lawyers. Harvey’s use is paired with a disclaimer stating that it may only be used under the supervision of qualified legal professionals.

What does this mean for firms?

In large firms such as Allen & Overy, AI-tools such as Harvey can achieve significant cost savings by reducing the time spent by fee earners on lengthy tasks such as those relating to contract analysis, due diligence and regulatory compliance. These capabilities will be particularly useful when dealing with cross-border transactions with international clients and offices.  Its machine learning capabilities mean that Harvey’s skill set will continually improve, which will only make the financial benefit greater. It may also be viable for smaller firms to use similar technologies to the same effect. For example, the lengthy tasks that would traditionally require a large team of solicitors, paralegals and other support staff, could now be achievable within smaller teams and tighter deadlines.

What does this mean for clients?

It will free up lawyers time, as they will no longer need to manually edit legal documents, perform extensive legal research, undertake the same level of contract analysis or due diligence reporting personally. They can use Harvey for these tasks, and then spend their time by making themselves more accessible to clients and allowing them to focus on the more complex and higher-value elements of their job. As a result, these time-saving capabilities may, in turn, extend the costs-savings for firms to their clients.

In the words of Wim Dejonghe, a Senior Partner at Allen & Overy, Harvey will “enable us to deliver unprecedented value, efficiency and innovation to our clients”.

Harvey is still in its beta phase of its development, its true capabilities are yet to be seen. Nevertheless, this is just another example of how AI is being utilised to fundamentally change the way legal advice is provided and how lawyers spend their time. There is no escaping the fact that AI will be part of every law firm’s future – big or small.

 

Emily Wickington and Joshua Perry

 

 

 

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