| Early case assessment and fixed cost eDiscovery | | | | guarding of information is a competitive |
| are two areas in legal risk management that | | | | advantage in the world of legal wrangling.' |
| require specific attention. Fixed cost eDiscovery is | | | | The competitive advantage presents itself |
| designed to address the financial risk associated | | | | because the legal process is full of gray areas. We |
| with large legal cases. For additional information on | | | | know, through our interview series, that legal |
| eDiscovery go to The outcome of fixed cost | | | | counsel will expand the scope of any information |
| eDiscovery is reduced exposure to the cost and | | | | based activity. Understanding ones capabilities, |
| time spent reviewing and analyzing the data after | | | | custodians and case information ahead of a |
| a legal case is underway. Early case assessment is | | | | meet-and-confer meeting can mean the |
| a process that can reduce legal risk exposure by | | | | difference between 10 terabytes of information |
| offering a necessary view into the case | | | | and 10 gigabytes of information, or roughly 600 |
| information, i.e. custodians, context, third-parties, | | | | million individual pages versus 600,000 individual |
| etc. The latter is a legal risk competitive | | | | pages. Legal counsel can use the fore knowledge |
| advantage; the former is simply cost containment. | | | | gained through early case assessment to steer |
| Early case assessment is done by an organization | | | | the meet-and-confer meeting to their advantage, |
| to manage the organizations legal risk exposure. | | | | as opposed to sharing their complete capability. |
| Early case assessment (ECA) can be considered | | | | Fixed cost eDiscovery can become a liability for |
| the artillery in the armory that legal counsel takes | | | | some companies because the opposing counsel |
| to their meet-confer meetings. ECA includes | | | | could use the published financial information their |
| information about custodians, context and | | | | advantage. For example, if you told the opposing |
| concepts and will help legal counsel manage the | | | | counsel you used Huron Consulting V3locity, they |
| outcome of the meet-and-confer meetings. | | | | would know the cost per document page is about |
| However, it is not supposed to be this way. | | | | .25cents. On the contrary, if you used services |
| According to The Honorable Judge Peter Flynn of | | | | from KPMG, a very guarded company, then your |
| the Circuit Court of Cook County, Chancery | | | | opposition would have little or no information. In |
| Division, Illinois, Meet-and-confer meeting's are | | | | legal, the less information your opponent has, the |
| supposed to be about putting your IT cards on | | | | better off you are. |
| the table, what one can and cannot do with | | | | Using commodity based early case assessment |
| respect to data, data types, collections, | | | | tools may introduce legal risk your company may |
| preservations, data transformations, etc. Judge | | | | not want to manage. For example, if the opposing |
| Flynn responded to a question related to guarded | | | | counsel has foreknowledge of the products you |
| sharing of IT capability during meet-and-confer | | | | use, such as Autonomy/Aungate, Attenex or |
| meetings during last weeks live Panel Discussion | | | | Clearwell Systems, they know your capability to |
| on Document Review Acceleration, hosted by | | | | identify concepts, custodians, etc. Using software |
| Epiq Systems. He responded saying it was "Flat | | | | to create legal leverage without sharing to the |
| dead wrong, sanctionable." According to Judge | | | | world how you do it, can improve your |
| Flynn, guarding IT and ECA information during | | | | competitive advantage in the early phases of |
| meet-and-confers is probably illegal. His response | | | | litigation. |
| and the participant question make it clear that 'the | | | | |