Legal technology provider LexisNexis Legal & Professional has officially launched Lexis+ AI™ in the Australian market and opened up availability for all Australian customers. The solution gives lawyers access to the LexisNexis database of legislation, case law and commentary through its conversational AI assistant.

This comes after a successful trial phase since February this year, with more than 300 Australian legal practitioners across the entire industry.

Following the launch, Holding Redlich has become one of the first law firms in Australia (along with Clayton Utz) to adopt and integrate the solution into its practice.

Lexis+ AI technology features conversational search, insightful summarisation, and intelligent legal drafting and document upload capabilities, all supported by state-of-the-art encryption and privacy technology to keep sensitive data secure.

All results are backed by verifiable, citable authority or source – and Holding Redlich chief knowledge officer Keren Smith said she was excited about the future of legal research technology.

“Lexis+ AI capabilities, including conversational search, insightful summarisation, and intelligent document drafting, will not only expedite research processes but also help to deliver efficiencies and effectiveness for legal practitioners,” she said.

“The case summary feature significantly expedites our research, allowing lawyers to quickly identify relevant cases and avoid irrelevant ones. This alone has the potential to save significant amounts of time. Last week, one of our lawyers spent four and a half hours completing a legal research task using traditional research methods. Using Lexis+ AI, he was able to replicate that same task in 30 minutes.”

This comes after Holding Redlich hosted a Turing test in October last year, demonstrating that Lexis Argument Analyser, an extractive AI feature, could outperform human capability in suggesting relevant case law to strengthen legal submissions.

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“However, to get the most from Lexis+ AI, or any other generative AI legal research tool, you still need to be a legal professional. Used correctly, these tools will free up time for lawyers to focus on other important tasks such as building their client base,” Smith said.

“It is an excellent starting point, but lawyers still need to read cases and apply the same standard of due diligence such as checking accuracy of footnotes and citations as they would with traditional legal research.”

Lexis+ AI also mitigates the risk of generating court fillings containing hallucinated precedents. After generating a court document, Lexis+ AI validates its citations against its entire database of primary and analytical content.

“We are supporting the research and development of generative AI across the industry,” Smith said.

“LexisNexis is a key content provider, so their roadmap will be closely watched and will inform our own innovation program so that we continue to deliver tailored legal solutions for our clients. As one of the first large law firms to adopt Lexis+ AI, we are pleased to see the legal research efficiencies the tool has to offer.

“We anticipate that Lexis+ AI will bring even greater benefits, supporting our commitment to innovation and excellence in legal service.”

Lauren Croft

Lauren is a journalist at Lawyers Weekly and graduated with a Bachelor of Journalism from Macleay College. Prior to joining Lawyers Weekly, she worked as a trade journalist for media and travel industry publications and Travel Weekly. Originally born in England, Lauren enjoys trying new bars and restaurants, attending music festivals and travelling. She is also a keen snowboarder and pre-pandemic, spent a season living in a French ski resort.