Despite the massive adoption of digital tools in sales, HR or finance, the legal remains frequently perceived as an isolated, reactive, not very scaling counter. The law is still based on a logic of intellectual crafts. However, the company evolves in a logic of automation, fast iterations, integrated workflows. But with regard to the number of legaltech that develop on the chessboard, it is indisputable that a rocking is underway.
For Ross McNairnfounder and CEO of the Wordsmith startup, the diagnosis is that: “It is not a question of resources, but of architecture. The law continues to function as a desk service, while the company requires scalability. This declaration, resulting from the press release accompanying Wordsmith’s fundraising, sums up a paradigm shift, namely that The legal performance lever no longer lies in the addition of talents, but in the overhaul of the operating model.
The myth of overload
In many companies, lawyers are crumbling under requests, reviews of tense flow contracts, strategic purchasing validations, regulatory framing of HR projects, interpretation of internal policies … Each service needs legal, but few understand its constraints.
The classic answer consists of strengthensometimes to outsource, often to prioritize in an emergency. But that does not settle anything because The origin of the slowdown is not human, it is systemic. As I said before, I right still rests on a logic of intellectual crafts, document by document, request by request. However, the company evolves in the speed of execution, the standardization of processes and the systematic integration of business tools
From delegation to orchestration
This is where a radical alternative comes in with the distributed architecture of the legal function. Rather than passing each decision by the “law office”, why not equip other functions With intelligent agents capable of carrying legal principles as close as possible to the action?
This is the promise of platforms like Wordsmithwhich allow lawyers toencapsulate their reasoning in IA agentscapable of rereading a contract, detecting an anomaly, annotating a clause, generating a reliable translation or answering a question of conformity … and this without the lawyer being systematically mobilized.
These agents are not content to perform repetitive tasks but embody a new way of thinking about the impact of legal as a Structuring brick of decision -making architecture of the company.
A effervescence market
This approach is part of a wider dynamic rapid modernization of internal legal functions, which become a new application field for generative AI. Gartner estimates that 50 % of the legal support tasks could be automated by 2026. But the approaches vary according to the actors.
In the United States, Harveysupported by Openai and Sequoia, develops a co -pilot for large law firms. Spellbook offers a contractual assistant embedded in Word, while Ironclad Or Lexion position themselves on the management of the life cycle of contracts.
In Europe, the landscape remains exploded. In France, Doctrine,, Softlaw,, Gino Legaltech Or Seraphin.legal cover segments ranging from regulatory monitoring to the generation of contracts. Legartis (Swiss), Robin Ai (UK) or Juro (UK) seek to standardize contractual processes with more or less verticalized AI.
Where Wordsmith is clearly differentiatedit is in his ability to Integrate AI agents at the heart of business tools : Word, Slack, Gmail, Google Docs. And especially allow lawyers to build these agents themselvesalignment with their own style of negotiation and their contractual policy.
The network effect of legal reasoning
The value of the legal does not only reside in the decision itself, but in the ability to make this decision accessible, understandable and executable by other trades. Thus a legal reasoning should not die in an email or a Word file, but must be memorized in the legal culture of the company to be reused by in artificial intelligence agents.
This principle recalls the evolution experienced by other functions with The code that is no longer limited to the engineer, thanks to the No-Code; The data which is no longer the prerogative of analysts, thanks to the on -board bi; So tomorrow, legal logic will no longer be confined to lawyers.
This model requires strong hybridization between law, engineering, UX and product. And it is here that the “Legal Engineers” become the missing link. Lawyers will not have become coders, but will be architects of the dissemination of law in business systems.
A structural transformation, not cosmetic
Establishing this architecture is not one more “feature”, nor a simple automation of the rereading of NDA, it must be engaged in a transformation of the role of legal in the companyand by ricochet, of the perception of law as a strategic lever for all the activities of the company.
Wordsmith in figures
Founded at Edinburgh by Ross McNairnformer lawyer who has become a software engineer, Wordsmith ai ltd. announced on June 3, 2025 a fundraising of $ 25 million (around 23.2 million euros) in series A, led by Ventures index. The platform allows internal legal teams to create and deploy AI agents capable of processing contracts, analyzing policies, generating legal responses and integrating into existing tools (Slack, Word, Gmail, Google Docs). Wordsmith already has groups among its customers such as Deliveroo, Trustpilot, Remote Or Virginand plans to open offices to London, New York and elsewhere in Europe. A Wordsmith Legal Enablely Academy will be launched to support the skill rise in “Legal Engineers”.
