The Editor interviews Brian A. Davis, Co-chair of Choate Hall & Stewart LLP's Litigation Department. Founded in 1899, Choate is a Boston-based firm with a national legal practice. Choate has long been a believer in the "one-firm, one-roof" philosophy and offers its clients a unique alternative approach to the "big firm" legal model. Mr. Davis agreed to be interviewed regarding his firm's innovative e-discovery methodology and Choate's experience with Equivio>Relevance.
Editor: What are some of the biggest challenges around e-discovery in litigation?
Davis: The digital era caught the U.S. legal system somewhat unawares and has simultaneously created a wave of new problems and opportunities. While centralized servers, e-mail and mobile devices make day-to-day corporate life far more productive and efficient, these technologies also generate massive amounts of electronically stored information (ESI) that raises unique issues in the litigation context. In fact, with the cost of disposal for electronic data now greater than the cost of storing the data, many companies are literally swimming in ESI that can be relevant to a particular lawsuit or investigation. Dealing with the deluge in an efficient, defensible way poses a significant challenge.
The old ways of collecting, sifting and analyzing potentially relevant data obviously no longer work. Although some firms still are trying, it simply is not feasible, economically or otherwise, to review hundreds of gigabytes, or even terabytes, of ESI on a "page-by-page" basis. The costs can be prohibitive and the results uneven. Moreover, initial methods of managing the electronic discovery process developed over the last ten years or so have fallen short. Arbitrary keyword searches and other basic techniques, such as "fuzzy searches" or "clustering," often have proven to be over-inclusive, under-inclusive, or just plain inaccurate. The courts, as well as clients, are expressing increasing concern regarding these methodologies and their inherent drawbacks. It's clear that there needs to be new thinking at all levels about overcoming the problems posed by large volumes of ESI.
Editor: There has been a great deal of discussion about the very high costs associated with e-discovery. What have you done to help mitigate those costs for clients?
Davis: The Choate litigation model has long been focused on providing our clients with exceptional service at a reduced cost. We're not a 1,000+ lawyer firm with multiple offices; rather, we rely on lean case teams with all of our attorneys in one location in order to better manage and supervise the entire litigation process. We've also devoted a substantial amount of time and effort over the last few years identifying, adopting and refining the best e-discovery tools and techniques, and re-engineering the data collection and review process, so that we can better leverage our resources and deliver dramatically more "bang for the buck" to our clients. Because current approaches to e-discovery no longer are sustainable, the market for potential solutions has exploded - new e-discovery vendors and tools crop up just about every day. Our mission has been to find a truly innovative and useful approach, not the same old method reconfigured with a new design. Equivio>Relevance is one of the most impressive e-discovery tools that Choate identified.
Editor: What attracted Choate to the Equivio>Relevance Product?
Davis: Equivio>Relevance operates much differently than traditional e-discovery tools. Unlike many other analytical tools on the market, Equivio> Relevance does not rely upon keyword lists or complex linguistic models. Rather, it leverages the knowledge of the most informed and qualified members of the legal team, compiled through an iterative online training process, to automatically sort and rank potentially relevant ESI according to the data's relative significance to the case. In this way, Equivio>Relevance takes a multi-dimensional view of the data it assesses, distinguishing it from the older and less accurate linear model of data analysis.
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Source: metrocorpcounsel.com
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