The site, which provides in-house counsel with free access to major law firms’ precedents, now has lawyers from more than 175 firms and 150 companies signed up. When Legal Week broke news of the venture in June, around 60 law firms and just nine clients had joined.
Firms such as Linklaters, Allen & Overy, DLA Piper and White & Case are using the site to make contact with clients by offering them access to legal advice, precedents and updates, as well as networking facilities such as wikis and online chatrooms. Clients to have signed up so far include chemicals giant Chevron Philips and FMC Technologies.
Orrick is also using the site to advertise to potential new recruits. The
Orrick London litigation partner and training principal Simon Cockshutt said that the firm saw the site as a potentially invaluable new recruitment tool and was now eager to roll it out to law students and trainees in the
He said: “It comes with the firm’s endorsement and potential candidates can sign up knowing they can make contacts in a structured fashion. We are planning to take this back to law schools and universities and involve students in the site at the earliest stages of recruitment.”
The site, which was launched earlier this year by software development company Qulas for a consortium of nine major bluechip companies led by tech giant Cisco, is partially modelled on popular social networking sites such as Facebook. It allows lawyers access to a database of all members as well as forums for sharing information and documentation.
Qulas chief executive and former Synopsys general counsel Paul Lippe said that interest in the site had grown as companies and firms opened up separate, confidential sub-groups to allow for more in-depth exchanges of information.
“Lawyers are very sensitive to levels of confidentiality,” said Lippe. “People are identifying networks that they are interested in and creating their own company or firm-based groups to allow them to share deeper information.”
