AI and the Future of Law

The legal tech market is growing fast—but is it a bubble, or the beginning of a new era for legal services?
In this episode, Jen Leonard and Bridget McCormack are joined by Nikki Shaver, co-founder and CEO of Legaltech Hub, to discuss how AI is reshaping law firm strategy, pricing, technology selection, and competition. Nikki explains why firms are moving beyond efficiency as the main measure of AI value, how AI-native firms may challenge incumbents, and why agentic AI creates new governance and security questions for legal organizations.
In this episode:
How legal tech adoption has shifted since ChatGPT
Why AI value is moving from efficiency to quality
What AI-native firms mean for incumbent law firms
How law firms should evaluate legal tech startups
Why agentic AI raises new governance risks
What Nikki expects next for the legal tech market
Keywords:
legal tech, legal technology, AI in law, legal AI, law firm strategy, Nikki Shaver, Legaltech Hub, agentic AI, AI-native firms, law firm innovation, legal innovation, GenAI, legal tech bubble, future of law
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What happens when AI agents start making contracts with other AI agents?
In this episode, Jen Leonard and Bridget McCormack explore Legal Context Protocol, or LCP, a new open protocol designed to help legal terms become discoverable, verifiable, and connected to agentic transactions. Bridget explains why existing e-commerce legal infrastructure may not translate cleanly to a world where machines negotiate, accept terms, and complete transactions on behalf of people and businesses.
In this episode:
What Legal Context Protocol is designed to solve
Why agentic commerce creates new contract and ratification issues
How legal terms can become discoverable, verifiable, and connected to transactions
Why AI risk and legal-context risk should be separated
What general counsel and law firm partners should do now
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Can AI help lawyers learn—or does it weaken the skills legal training is meant to build?
In this episode, Jen Leonard and Bridget McCormack are joined by Daniel Schwarcz, Fredrikson & Byron Professor of Law at the University of Minnesota Law School, to discuss new empirical research on artificial intelligence and human legal reasoning. Daniel explains a randomized control trial studying how law students used AI to synthesize legal materials, apply legal rules, and revise legal analysis—and why some results surprised even the researchers.
In this episode:
Why legal training may prepare lawyers to use AI well
What the University of Minnesota study tested about AI and legal reasoning
Why AI-assisted students performed better than expected
The risks of using AI for revision under time pressure
What law schools and law firms should take away from the research
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The latest Am Law 100 power rankings reveal a legal industry undergoing rapid transformation—driven by shifting demand, intensifying competition, and the growing influence of AI. In this episode, Jen Leonard and Bridget McCormack are joined by legal industry analyst Jae Um to break down what’s changing in Big Law. They explore the rise of “apex predator” firms, widening performance gaps, evolving AI strategies, and early signs of client-side disruption.
In this episode:
Am Law 100 power rankings and market concentration
The rise of “apex predator” firms
AI strategy and firm-level competition
Shifting client demand and pricing pressure
The future structure of Big Law
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Artificial intelligence is moving beyond tools and into systems—reshaping how legal work is performed and delivered.
In this episode, Jen Leonard and Bridget McCormack speak with Jason Barnwell, Chief Legal Officer at Agiloft, about the rise of AI agents, contract lifecycle management, and what these shifts mean for legal practice.
They explore how some professionals are able to extract exponentially more value from AI than others, the growing importance of structuring legal knowledge into reusable protocols, and how contract data is becoming a strategic asset inside organizations. The conversation also examines shifting incentives, emerging career paths, and how legal education and training may need to evolve in response.
Topics discussed include:
AI agents and the shift from tools to systems
Why some professionals get exponentially more value from AI
Contract lifecycle management and the rise of contract data as infrastructure
The changing role of lawyers from executors to system architects
Legal education, training models, and new career pathways
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.