Harvey & Ironclad Partner: GenAI Boosts Inhouse Legal Tech Reach
In a significant move set to deepen its reach into the corporate legal sector, AI powerhouse Harvey has announced a strategic partnership with California-based Contract Lifecycle Management (CLM) leader Ironclad. This collaboration, driven by what Harvey CEO Winston Weinberg described as a “huge request from our inhouse customers,” follows Harvey’s earlier deal with rival Icertis last year, signaling a clear strategic focus on embedding its generative AI capabilities within corporate legal departments. The alliance also highlights an interesting web of connections in the legal tech ecosystem, with OpenAI serving as both a client of Ironclad and an investor in Harvey.
This partnership marks one of the first major strategic initiatives for Ironclad under its new CEO, Dan Springer, who took the helm in April after co-founder Jason Boehmig stepped down. Springer, a veteran of the tech industry and former CEO of DocuSign, is now overseeing Ironclad’s trajectory, which includes a roster of high-profile clients such as Salesforce, Cisco, Shell, and OpenAI. The core objective of the new collaboration is to integrate Ironclad’s intelligent, automated contract workflows with Harvey’s capacity to analyze and surface company positions impacted by regulatory shifts or changes in business models. In essence, it’s a powerful combination of Ironclad’s workflow automation and Harvey’s generative AI, fundamentally driven by the evolving needs of their shared clientele.
The decision to push deeper into the inhouse legal world represents a logical and potentially lucrative expansion for Harvey. While the number of major law firms that can adopt advanced productivity platforms like Harvey is finite, the corporate inhouse market presents a far more extensive and target-rich environment. However, successfully penetrating this market is not without its challenges. Many inhouse legal teams, while sophisticated, may lack dedicated legal tech experts. This is where a partnership with an established CLM provider like Ironclad becomes invaluable, as these companies have already invested considerable effort in connecting with and understanding the operational dynamics of legal departments. For mutual clients, the partnership offers a seamless integration, connecting Harvey’s analytical prowess with Ironclad’s existing contract management tools. Crucially, it also opens doors for Harvey to build new relationships with Ironclad’s extensive customer base that it has not yet engaged.
Ironclad’s journey with artificial intelligence has been noteworthy. Initially, the company adopted a cautious stance, opting to avoid Natural Language Processing (NLP) and Machine Learning (ML) solutions due to concerns about accuracy, even as many of its competitors embraced these technologies early on. This position shifted in September 2022 when Ironclad partnered with Google to incorporate ML/NLP for document analysis. Ironically, this move came just two months before the public launch of ChatGPT in November 2022, an event that profoundly reshaped the landscape of AI in the legal contract field. Now, with its alliance with Harvey, Ironclad is fully embracing generative AI, reflecting a significant evolution in its technological strategy.
Commenting on the collaboration, Ironclad CEO Dan Springer emphasized the synergistic potential. “This partnership is about bringing together two of the most powerful AI platforms in the legal tech ecosystem,” Springer stated. “Ironclad and Harvey are both exceptionally good at making lawyers more impactful, and in ways that accelerate the business as a whole. This partnership will unlock tremendous value for our customers.” As legal technology continues to evolve at a rapid pace, this alliance between Harvey and Ironclad underscores a growing trend towards integrated, AI-driven solutions designed to enhance efficiency and strategic insight within corporate legal operations.