Management and tracking of court and litigation related matters, including matter progress, important dates, documents, budgets, expenses is a common pain point across the legal industry. To empower legal teams, Manupatra has launched ‘myKase’ — a cloud-based platform that integrates, streamlines and automates the activities and operations of law practice, beginning from Intake to Matter Disposal. It enables teams to collaborate and communicate seamlessly across locations, offices and time zones through a single unified platform.
myKase is a SaaS product designed for lawyers, law firms, domain professionals and can be used to aid in any litigation and legal projects.
Building on its knowledge and expertise of over 20 years, in delivering legal solutions by leveraging technology, Manupatra has conceived and developed myKase for the legal fraternity, which enables law practices to adopt digital transformation in a blended manner. With the new normal of #WFA [work from anywhere], a cloud based solution such as myKase is the perfect answer for practices to operate effortlessly.
An insight into the innovation/technology and the inspiration behind it:
The basic premise behind conception of myKase is to make legal operations efficient, seamless, objective, in a blended model.
myKase was conceived in 2019, much before the pandemic hit us. The plan was to build a solution where you can manage all legal operations remotely, through a single unified platform. Starting with collaborating on tasks and documents, to client meetings, delivery deadlines, managing teams, billing, expenses, communication, etc. The lawyer could be in the court, at client’s site, in office, traveling or at home, the accessibility to documents, files, people, status needed to be seamless and uniform.
Every day, legal departments and law practices make decisions, about resourcing, budget, training, engaging with clients, planning etc. Many of these decisions are made based on judgement, experience, intuition or qualitative information – ‘gut feel’. The decisions are more objective when based on quantitative information, and reduces the uncertainty which gut feel decisions may bring.
From typewriters to computers and from fax machines to email, each advancement has been transformative in law. Lawyers have accepted and adopted each of these evolutions. The need to digitally transform legacy systems, workplace and customer experience thus is imminent.
myKase EMS is compatible with all devices and operating systems with security as the paramount consideration. This technological solution helps law practices with geographically dispersed teams to collaborate and work together all through myKase. The data capturing makes available reports and metrics, which makes decision making easier and objective.
The journey so far:
Manupatra are the pioneers in legal tech and online legal research in India since 2001. We are one of the very few pure play internet companies in legal and business information, search, analytics and technology space. Over the years, we have grown into a 4 product (and growing) enterprise with
- Manupatra – flagship product. Online legal database and research tool.
- Lawskills – Self paced online learning platform
- CaseWatch – Case Tracker
- myKase – Enterprise Mobility Solution
Innovation and technological advancement have been the driving factors behind Manupatra which has resulted in our consistent disruption to make available services to the legal fraternity. Every product we launch is based on solving problems through technology and myKase follows suit.
The Law Firm Practice Management platform provides solutions to:
- Corporate Legal Departments,
- Project management for Corporates
- Online Dispute Resolution
- Contract Management
- Relevance with the Indian Context
Today, the law practices are under immense pressure to embrace the digital, operate more efficiently and enhance team performance. 2020 has further redefined the way we work and collaborate. Now in 2021, practices are required to focus on streamlining the workforce, rethink operational infrastructure and adapt to remote and blended models of working. Due to the pandemic, many lawyers had to redefine their digital strategies, invest in new technologies, processes and people much before they would have otherwise. Building on its knowledge and expertise of over 20 years in delivering legal solutions by leveraging technology, Manupatra has conceived and developed myKase for the legal fraternity. On one platform, you get a streamlined integrated virtual workspace to provide you the digital transformation your law practice needs.
Key features of myKase:
The software has a number of key features, including
- legal case management, to store, track and manage cases with centralized document storage, time entry, contacts, communication, tasks, and alerts regarding court hearing dates
- document management to keep documents, agreements, notes, and emails organized by matter, indexed, and searchable
- Document editing and versioning to create, edit and co-edit, preserve versions of documents and mark confidentiality as required in documents.
myKase software introduces the concept of client portal, which gives authorised access, for your clients to have an individualised experience. Thereby, it promotes client retention. Additionally, it helps users gain access to the most accurate and current client’s data using a centralized contact database. Workflow is managed through task management which organizes, manages, enables collaboration and tracks your and the team’s tasks with a simple and intuitive interface. myKase is completely searchable and comes with a global search which allows one search across emails, documents, communication, tasks and all the information available on the myKase platform.
Other features include, reminders of court dates and staff meetings, with deadlines and appointments managed in a centralised calendar. Dropbox, Google Meet, Bundling PDFs’, OCR, Compare documents, Outlook, CaseWatch, Manupatra and similar applications, tools and software have been integrated, so that a user does not need to jump to different applications and software.
myKase aims to make work seamless and efficient for legal professionals by bringing everything — people, files, documents, tasks, timelines, contacts, invoicing and expense recording, on an easy-to-use, unified cloud-based platform.
With myKase, the managing partners and project heads can track multiple projects, matters, employees, revenue and expenditure all through one virtual workspace.
Dealing with competition:
myKase is a ‘concept sell’. The biggest competition is ‘resistance to change/adopt’ by the teams. The success in the short run will lie in how well we assist the senior brass to get the teams to adopt. It has to be acknowledged that an investment in technology is no longer a discretionary investment but an imperative one.
Legal practice management is in early stages and thus the market is big enough for multiple players. The requirement specs are so varied and so many that each player will evolve with their own USP’s in the space and the market has enough options to evaluate and grow at a pace conducive to change
How the next 5 years will look like:
For all businesses and practice, the next 5 years entail: reimagining work, talent, and technology to improve processes, better align work with skills, and achieve the full potential of enabling technologies. Transition smoothly and confidently to a more connected, modernized approach to operations.
This is a process which has begun and fast forwarded by the pandemic. myKase and Manupatra will continue to be invested in bringing forth user friendly solutions for the users.
Advice for fellow change-makers and readers:
Any product that is backed by technology which solves a problem and is easy to use should be the focus of research and development right now.
More specifically, 2020 has redefined the way we work, collaborate and learn on the job. Enterprises are required to focus on streamlining their workforce, rethink operational infrastructure and adapt to remote and blended models.
Start with:
- Understanding where your department / business is, and how progress can be accelerated.
- Analyze your specific requirement and identify the right platform
- Understand the challenges associated with the new normal, and tackle business pain points with tech innovation
- Leverage IT-driven collaboration and communication across teams / business
Also read: Lawcadia: a new age Australian legaltech company that is ‘SaaS’-ing the legal industry
