DAC LICENCE DIY CASE PLANNING APPLICATION
London law firm Davies Arnold Cooper this week announced it had entered into a licence agreement to use a state-of-the-art costs estimating and case planning software known as Feesability. The program was developed by Dan Tench, when he was a solicitor at Lovells, together with other members of the Lovells litigation practice. Feesability is widely used within Lovells to provide costs estimates and case plans to clients. Davies Arnold Cooper is the first firm other than Lovells to be licensed to use the software.

Dan Tench, the solicitor who designed Feesability (he is now with Olswang) said: "The Feesability program was developed very much with lawyers in mind. Other project management software is available commercially but we considered this to be not especially appropriate for use in litigation. We also thought it was important that the development of case plans and costs estimates was integrated closely into the normal running of a case. This would not be achieved if specialist technical staff were needed to operate the software and the program is therefore designed for hands-on use by practising lawyers.

"The software has been continually developed and fine-tuned over the past four years. In this time, we have been able to see how the software was used by lawyers and we have incorporated new ideas to allow it be used more simply but to greater effect."

Feesability is written in Microsoft Visual Basic Version 6.0. It works on any computer running 32-bit Microsoft Windows 95,98, 2000 or NT. As an .EXE application it requires no software other than Windows to operate. The entry level for pricing is in the region of £100 per user. For more details email: feesability@talk21.com.

PcW TO BACK FIRSTLAW
London-based FirstLAW, the world's first fully regulated, online-only solicitors practice, has secured investment funding and additional support facilities from the venture capital group PricewaterhouseCoopers Incubator. FirstLAW's founder Anthony Armitage said the collaboration with PwC would "pave the way for the rapid expansion of the FirstLAW business model during 2001. We aim to be the preferred business-to-business exchange for legal services operating globally." FirstLAW's non-executive chairman David McIntosh is the serving vice president of the English Law Society.

FREE ISP GROUP THREATENING TO SUE BUSINESS USERS
The Free Internet Group, a UK ISP offering unmetred access to users, says it is investigating the possibility of taking legal action against 12 of its members which, TFIG claims, have been misusing the service for commercial purposes. TFIG says it plans to seek compensation from these users - assuming it can prove they were in breach of its terms and conditions of service.

IN SPREADSHEETS WE TRUST
According to a new survey of UK law firm private client departments preparing trust and estate accounts and associated tax returns, almost two-thirds do not use purpose built applications, whereas 92 percent believed IT awareness was a crucial element when recruiting new staff for the department. The survey, conducted by Solution 6, found that most firms were still using Microsoft Excel spreadsheets and then laboriously re-entering investment details into a tax package or form-filling software.

The good news is that 23 per cent of respondents still using spreadsheets or form-filling software said they were considering switching to purpose built software. According to Steve Howells of Wilsons in Salisbury, one of the largest law firms in the South West, using trust accounting software cuts 25 percent from the time required to produce trust accounts as changes ripple through the system automatically. Using automated accounts production cuts a further 20 percent from the time to produce a set of accounts. Finally, integrating the tax and accounts saves about 30 percent of the normal time to produce SA900s.

LAW FIRMS PIONEER INTRANET INSURANCE SERVICE FOR EMPLOYEES
UK Law firms Olswang and Shoosmiths, together with Merrill Lynch, Gerrard, Singer & Friedlander, Baillie Gifford, Insignia Richard Ellis and three of the top five accountancy firms have all signed deals with Hiscox to be the first firms to offer all employees access to a fully-transactional home insurance service from their desks.

The new Hiscox Online professionals' scheme will cater for all employees at any salary level or stage of their career. The key criteria is that they are home owners or home-renters with contents valued at £15K or more and/or home rebuilding cost of £40K or more. The scheme offers employees of professional firms broader protection than conventional household insurance policies, including "all risks" cover and options to add specialist cover for valuables such as art and antiques. Employees will be able to log in and manage their own home and contents insurance at any time of the day or night from changing their bank or personal details, to updating their policy when they add new acquisitions or additional policyholders.

ELAW ATTRACTS DOLAN
Texas-based legal systems supplier eLaw.com has appointed Kevin Dolan as its new vice president of sales. Dolan is a well known player in the litigation support systems field, having worked previously with such companies as Bowne JFS Software and Summation Legal Technology. He was also one of the founders of Data Dynamics, the developers of DiscoveryZX, one of the first PC-based litigation software applications.

OVUM PREDICTS SHAKE-UP IN CONTENT & CASE MANAGEMENT MARKET
The independent analyst and consulting company Ovum has published a controversial new report predicting that the imminent release of Microsoft's new SharePoint Portal Server (SPS) product will force smaller vendors out of the content and workflow management market, leaving many unable to compete, unless they form new partnerships.

According to the report "The focused strategies of Microsoft and Lotus (through its Domino product range) will result in a new commodity (ie an integrated content management and workflow technology solution for large groups of users at a low seat price) at a fraction of the cost charged by their competitors in the market today.

"Although a few companies (such as Documentum, FileNET, IBM and Open Text) with established client bases in vertical markets will be able to compete within their spheres, many smaller vendors will be forced out. Ovum predicts that for many smaller vendors, particularly workflow vendors, their best chance of surviving is by merging with a larger organisation..."

Along with apparently predicting the demise of iManage and PC Docs, this Ovum report also appears to sound the death-knell of the whole legal case management (which is effectively a form of workflow product) software industry. Ovum estimates the content management market will be worth $7 billion by 2006. Sorry Ovum but we think the specialist niche market needs of the legal sector - plus the fact law firms have already invested millions of pounds (and dollars) in these technologies - will mean the majority of content and case management software suppliers will still be with us for many years to come.

AMLAW BUYS JURY VERDICT RESEARCH PUBLISHER
The US legal publishing group American Lawyer Media has purchased the assets of Haslam Publications, a leading publisher of jury verdict and settlement research data in California. The acquisition follows ALM's purchase of Moran Publishing, New York's largest verdict research firm, and Blue Sheet Publications, the leading publisher of jury verdict research in Texas and four other states. The financial terms of the agreement were not disclosed.

TRADEMARK AND BRAND NEWS
This week saw the launch in London of RioBrand, a new online system offering a global resource for brand managers and IP lawyers wanting to protect their trademarks and brand names against both innocent and malign infringement. There is no charge for searching the database on brands but organisations wanting to publish details of the brands must pay a fee - rates start at £250 a brand.

In a related development the Venezuela-based trademark registration site Demarcas has begun operations in Brazil. The service also operates in Argentina and Uruguay and plans to launch in Chile and Mexico this March. Demarcas allows companies to search for existing trademarks, as well as to file registration requests for new trademarks. It then handles the entire registration process, providing client support both in the online and offline worlds.
www.riobrand.com
www.demarcas.com

WOLTERS KLUWER ACQUIRES LOISLAW
Wolters Kluwer has announced that the tender offer period for all shares of Loislaw.com, a US online legal information provider, has been concluded. Wolters Kluwer paid $95 million for Loislaw, which now becomes a wholly owned subsidiary of Aspen Publishers, part of Wolters Kluwer North America.

Loislaw is a provider of primary and secondary source material for legal research that is delivered on a subscription basis over the internet. It has projected 2000 sales of approximately $14 million. Loislaw provides more than 2200 databases and citation research services, containing more than 10 million documents, covering federal case law, statutory law, administrative law, court rules and other legal information for the US as well as for all 50 states and the District of Columbia. Its Lois LawWatch provides personalized, intelligent search agents that automatically and continuously search the Loislaw web site and notifies subscribers when new documents match their search criteria. In addition, the company provides Loislawschool.com to faculty and students in 95 percent of the American Bar Association accredited law schools.

KIDMAN LEAVES CRUISE BUT GETS THE DOMAIN NAMES
Actress Nicole Kidman, who this week saw the break up of her marriage with Tom Cruise and the start of what could be a bitter divorce battle, has won the right to the domain names www.nicolekidmannude.com and www.nicholekidman.com from cybersquatters.

DESKTOP LAWYER IN US DEAL
Epoch Software, the company behind the UK's Desktop Lawyer online legal service, this month launched a similar service in the United States in association with "pre-paid" legal expenses cover specialist ARAG. Access to the service will now be offered as part of employee benefits schemes operated by over 200 major US corporations. Epoch's co-founder Richard Cohen said that thanks to the ARAG deal and a similar arrangement in the UK with the Royal & SunAlliance insurance group, Desktop Lawyer would soon have what was effectively the largest legal practice in the world. The ARAG scheme is at
www.lawexpress.com

BAD TIMES FOR ONLINE INVESTMENT SITES
Online investment web sites and bulletin board services have had a bad week.

Yun Soo Oh Park - otherwise known as Tokyo Joe and described by the Wall Street Journal as a "burrito vendor turned internet stock guru" - has agreed to return about $750,000 in trading profits as part of a settlement of securities fraud charges brought against him by the US Securities & Exchange Commission. The SEC accused Park of being a stock manipulator who had failed to disclose to subscribers to his online tips service that he bought shares in the companies he subsequently recommended investors to buy, and then sold those shares as their prices rose on the strength of his "buy" recommendations.

Bob Zumbrunnen, the official "shepherd" of the often-fractious stock-discussion boards on Silicon Investor, was fired Tuesday. His departure triggered a flood of protests and worries that online-stock communities are an endangered species. And, on Thursday Motley Fool announced that it was shedding about one third of its staff - 109 redundancies in Washington and six in London - as part of a "reappraisal of its revenue and profit stream". A company spokesman said that in the light of falling advertising revenues, the company would be "adopting an old economy approach to profitability".

FIRST LICENSED WEB SITE GOES LIVE
This month saw the UK's first licensed web site go live. The - www.champagnewarehouse.com - sells champagnes that are unavailable through conventional retail outlets. Because the site is a virtual off-license - most internet sites selling alcohol online can do so because they are a web offshoot of a licensed bricks and mortar retail outlet - the business had to apply for a license. Champagne Warehouse was advised on the legal issues by Addleshaw Booth & Co.

LEGAL TECHNOLOGY NEWS.COM - FROM THE PUBLISHERS OF LEGAL TECHNOLOGY INSIDER. NEXT ISSUE 16.02.2001