ONP Group and Xperate collaborate to develop ChatGPT Microsoft add-In for the legal profession
21 March 2023
ONP Group and Xperate have announced a collaborative project to develop a Microsoft add-in for Outlook and Word specifically designed to address the needs and concerns of the legal profession.
Legal PAI (Personal Artificial Intelligence) leverages the capabilities of ChatGPT, an AI-powered language model, to assist law firms in drafting and responding to documents and emails.
Andrew Taylor, Chief Technology Officer at ONP Group commented: “Technological developments are changing the way we live and work by the day and, at ONP Group, we aim to be at the cutting edge of this development, improving experiences for our clients, enabling our teams to do the best work of their lives, and speeding up the whole legal process.
“We found the perfect partner for this project in Xperate, as they are a leading development company that really understands the capabilities of AI in the legal industry.
“Through partnership-based co-creation, we aim to develop a deeper understanding of customers' needs, leading to clearer communication and increased client satisfaction. Working with Xperate and their early adopter program will provide the best opportunity for the legal industry to identify practical uses of Chat-GPT and other leading artificial intelligence.”
The collaboration project comes as, tech-giant Microsoft also announced its own project, Copilot, a general-purpose tool to assist with document, email, and presentations.
Legal PAI is focussed on the legal sector with the ability to include sensitive data in the draft responses without that data ever being submitted to ChatGPT, overcoming privacy concerns that law firms have with this new technology. As a result, Legal PAI can access information in the law firms Practice and Case Management System (PCMS) confident that no actual data is disclosed. Additional safeguards have been added to ensure a full audit trail of all requests and responses to ChatGPT is maintained.
The product will work with a series of commands, to improve documents for customers making them more effective as well as easier to read and respond to. It will be a vital tool for legal professionals, enabling them to instruct Legal PAI to make suggested improvements to documents and correspondence and even create additional content.
The aim is to help lawyers become increasingly effective and improve their interaction with clients. The objective will also be to improve the experience for the clients, providing them with the information they need, when they want it and in a way that is easy to understand. This in turn should significantly speed up the legal process in all the areas that the lawyers control.
Mark Garnish, Chief Operating Officer of Xperate was just as enthusiastic: “We are used to being asked to get involved in development projects at the leading edge of legal technology innovation and were delighted when ONP Group asked us to work with them on this initiative; this development will revolutionise the way that lawyers interact with email and word in the future.”
Xperate will be launching an early adopter program for a small number of firms in the UK and the USA to help us get the right balance between harnessing the power of ChatGPT and understandable privacy concerns. If you would like to be involved or for further information, please visit the Xperate website.
Stockport-based ONP Group incorporates O’Neill Patient Solicitors, Grindeys, and Cavendish Legal Group, and has been at the forefront of using digital technology to make conveyancing faster and more efficient.
In 2021, ONP Group moved its head office into the second and third floors at the prestigious six-storey 2 Stockport Exchange office building, which is part of the £145m Stockport Exchange development. A further three office locations are spread across the UK, in London, Stoke-on-Trent and Leeds.
