Of Legal Technology Trade Shows: LEGALTECH, NY, 2009
Last week we participated as an Exhibitor at LEGALTECH, New York. This is the largest legal technology show in the world, attracting over 13,000 visitors. The seminar program is excellent and if you want to keep in touch with emerging legal trends in Big Law, this is the place to be.
What is notable about LEGALTECH , from our point view is how focused it is on ediscovery, litigation support, and the legal technology challenges facing large law firms and corporate legal departments. Our offering - the DirectLaw web service is specifically designed for the needs of solos and small law firms. Out of the hundreds of technology vendors a very small percentage were targeted to the needs of solos and small law firms. And the number of visitors to the exhibits from solos and small law firms were a relatively small percentage when compared to the number of visitors from larger law firms, corporate legal departments, and technology consultants serving larger organizations.
From passing through the exhibit hall (at the New York Hilton), one would think that the world of legal technology consists of primarily ediscovery vendors. There were so many ediscovery and litigation support vendors that I began to wonder whether the market was either so enormous, or that half these vendors were going broke as they all seemed to be chasing the same business and the same large corporate clients.
To be fair to Incisive Media, the promoter of LEGALTECH, they disclosed that attendees from solos and small law firms would be a smaller percentage would compared to representatives from other sectors of the legal technology community. We didn't realize how small this percentage would be.
We did pick up enough new clients for DirectLaw to cover our direct expenses, but the time cost of our team doesn't justify the investment . So we won't be back next year and we don't recommend LEGALTECH to legal technology vendors if you are trying to reach solos and small law firms.
We are also exhibiting at ABA TECHSHOW in Chicago in April and we think this is a much better venue for reaching solos and small law firms. The seminar program is much more diverse and there are many sessions that would appeal to the smaller law firm. If you plan on attending ABA TECHSHOW in April, stop in see us at Booth #210.
