The legal sector is not known for being high tech. The court system is still hopelessly analogue and – while some City firms have embraced digitisation – the emphasis is still on human judgement and billable hours.
Big data has the power to change this, however – at least in the litigation funding sector. Litigation analytics tools scour large quantities of data to predict case outcomes, and the likely cost and length of a claim. They can also build profiles of the parties involved, including judges. What sort of decisions have they made in the past? Have they displayed any behavioural patterns?
In answering these questions, data tools promise to bolster funders’ profits – and raise the risk of a reaction from the courts, as has already happened in France.