Gleiss Lutz
Leading German law firm revolutionizes legal workflows with seamless OpenText™ eDiscovery integration
About Gleiss Lutz
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Employees:800
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Awards:42 Law Firm of the Year awards
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Awards:Numerous awards for Legal Tech and innovation
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Annual revenue:Approximately €288.8 million
Summary
Challenges
- Data transfer between platforms required.
- Key data points and native documents need to be handed over.
- High-stakes legal cases require scalable, accurate solutions.
Solution
- Enhanced capabilities with seamless integration.
- Automated data transfer with FactSync.
- Optimized large-scale data management with automation.
Results
Realized innovative optimization of data transfer
Achieved scalability for complex cases
Rapidly delivered strategically important facts
Challenges
- Legal tech tool FactTracker requires data transfer of key metadata and native documents from OpenText™ eDiscovery
- High-stakes legal cases rely on scalable, accurate solutions
Legal tech is transforming the legal industry with the aim to reduce manual labor, minimize errors, and improve access to legal services. While Gleiss Lutz recognized the opportunities this offers the firm very early on, implementing it is not without its challenges to the way in which things have worked for many decades. A typical legal review process involves multiple stages, including first-level review, second-level review, and the documentation of review findings.
Gleiss Lutz’s Director Legal Operations and Business Technologies, Marc Geiger, explained, “One of our aims in deploying sophisticated legal tech is to automate repetitive manual tasks associated with the review workflow. This creates a working environment that gives our lawyers greater scope for individual and personal advice.”
He added, “Many cases involve analyzing thousands, or even hundreds of thousands, of data pieces for relevant information. We used to manage this through Excel and Word documents, which proved time-consuming. Our lawyers needed to focus on strategic decisions, not on sifting through unstructured data.” This improved when introducing OpenText™ eDiscovery. The solution empowered users at Gleiss Lutz to take greater control over collecting and culling data intelligently, so that the legal teams review only what is necessary, reducing costs and risks.
The firm also developed FactTracker, an award-winning in-house legal tech tool for storing, structuring and processing the document review findings in major projects, integrating these into the review workflow. The platform is built on a SharePoint base and was initially developed for Gleiss Lutz’s corporate law division where typically large volumes of data need to be analyzed. The tool was enthusiastically received by the corporate law division, but it soon became popular with other divisions, by teams managing cases involving mergers and acquisitions, compliance and investigations, and antitrust.
OpenText eDiscovery became a valuable data source to FactTracker, leveraging its built-in data analytics and technology-assisted review (TAR) capabilities. This gave legal teams early and important insights to quickly understand and intelligently organize data. As OpenText eDiscovery can provide a streamlined process that quickly surfaces relevant content, it was important that findings in OpenText eDiscovery were transferred to FactTracker so that legal teams have all the relevant information at their fingertips.
“We were looking for optimized performance when transferring review findings from OpenText eDiscovery to FactTracker,” said Geiger. “Review results, including metadata and native documents, needed to be handed over from OpenText eDiscovery. Key data points such as document title, custodian details, and relevant dates are required for our work in FactTracker. Consistency between the tools is important.”
The effective integration between the trusted OpenText eDiscovery platform and our in-house developed FactTracker shows a common commitment to innovation and excellence.
Solution
OpenText™ eDiscovery provided the foundation for a scalable, accurate, and tech-driven eDiscovery workflow. By building an automated integration to Gleiss Lutz’s in-house FactTracker, the firm reshaped data workflows for consistent efficiency.
Products deployed
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OpenText™ eDiscovery
Accelerate eDiscovery with AI-driven speed and precision
Enhancing capabilities with seamless integration
The Gleiss Lutz team aimed to streamline the documentation of review findings by integrating OpenText eDiscovery and FactTracker. This integration leveraged the strengths of both tools. OpenText eDiscovery excels at processing, analyzing, and surfacing relevant documents from large datasets through advanced analytics, TAR, and predictive coding. FactTracker builds on these findings by organizing them into a structured, centralized repository tailored for ongoing case management and reference. Designed to interconnect complex information structures and document review findings, FactTracker became a vital resource for managing legal case data efficiently. By automating the data transfer process, the team sought to enhance workflow capabilities, further improve data management, and ensure long-term accessibility of critical information to support future litigation and compliance needs.
Achieving this integration required close collaboration between OpenText Professional Services and the Gleiss Lutz technical team. Gleiss Lutz’s Manager Legal Tech & AI Moritz Krause said, “We presented FactTracker at a conference attended by our OpenText contacts, discussed continuous improvement and the possibility of integrating the two tools. Together, we evaluated our internal infrastructure and reviewed the technical specifics for integration. Based on these conversations, we developed and created FactSync.”
Automating data transfer with FactSync
FactSync, the integration workflow developed in-house by Gleiss Lutz, bridged the gap between OpenText™ eDiscovery and FactTracker. The project relied on close collaboration between OpenText and Gleiss Lutz. OpenText provided metadata insights and technical expertise, helping the firm navigate challenges such as inconsistent naming conventions in metadata fields. By working together, the teams developed a scalable, reliable workflow that supports the demands of large-scale legal matters.
Sophisticated data mapping was implemented to guarantee that OpenText eDiscovery metadata seamlessly transferred to the correct fields within FactTracker. The new workflow efficiently processed downloaded ZIP files from OpenText eDiscovery, creating FactTracker entries based on metadata and native documents—ensuring consistent, accurate data integration. OpenText eDiscovery data was transferred to FactTracker in batches, following the timeline of specific case review progress.
The integrated workflow automated the creation of FactTracker entries for reviewed documents, with fields such as custodian, document title, and dates populated directly from OpenText eDiscovery metadata. Fields requiring contextual information not available in the metadata are populated afterwards. This seamless integration enabled the automated transfer of review results, including source documents, review comments, and metadata, from OpenText eDiscovery to FactTracker. The combined repository allows the team to flag whether documents were submitted to authorities or discussed with custodians.
Krause commented, “By automating the integration of OpenText eDiscovery metadata, native documents and additional data sources into FactTracker, our system now offers an even more centralized, easily accessible resource for managing legal cases efficiently. It ensures our documentation is not only accurate but also accessible for years to come.”
Optimizing large-scale data management with automation
The integration improved the management of large datasets by enabling batch processing and consolidating key review documents into a central repository. This streamlined approach is an example for operational excellence:
With the integration in place, a set of facts is batch-exported from OpenText eDiscovery, and corresponding entries are automatically created in FactTracker. Metadata reference fields, such as custodian and document title, are pre-filled during the process. Manual input focuses on high-value tasks, such as adding unique, contextual information not available in the metadata.
By automating the integration of OpenText eDiscovery metadata, native documents and additional data sources into FactTracker, our system now offers an even more centralized, easily accessible resource for managing legal cases efficiently.
Results
The integration transformed Gleiss Lutz’s workflows, automating data processes and enhancing scalability for complex cases. This allowed the firm to continue delivering critical case information when needed.
Automated workflows and streamlined operations
The integration transformed how Gleiss Lutz managed data transfer between platforms. OpenText™ eDiscovery automated the prioritization and transfer of metadata, while FactSync streamlined the handover of information. This minimized the risk of errors and allowed legal teams to focus on the analysis of transferred data.
“This integration takes care of transferring data without additional review,” said Geiger. “We trust that the information is accurate and accessible which allows us to focus on building stronger cases.”
The combination of automation and advanced analytics within OpenText™ eDiscovery ensures that critical case information is available when needed, making review processes faster and more reliable.
Achieved scalability for complex cases
With OpenText™ eDiscovery’s robust capabilities, Gleiss Lutz can now better manage large-scale cases spanning years or even decades. FactSync’s ability to centralize and organize data within FactTracker ensures that critical facts remain accessible for the lifetime of a case. Recently, multiple large corporate law, compliance and antitrust matters have required managing tens of thousands of interconnected facts over several years.
“With our integrated solution, we do not worry about losing sight of key information or managing fragmented files,” said Moritz, “Our legal teams can confidently track and retrieve data no matter how complex the case becomes.” This future-proof approach has positioned Gleiss Lutz to handle cases of increasing scale and complexity without sacrificing accuracy or efficiency.
This partnership between a technology company and a law firm confirmed Gleiss Lutz’s pioneering role in legal tech. Geiger said, “The effective integration between the trusted OpenText eDiscovery platform and our in-house developed FactTracker shows a common commitment to innovation and excellence. OpenText provided essential proactive and responsive support throughout the process. The collaboration reinforces our brand image as a forward-thinking firm, focused on always improving our client outcomes.”
Delivered data-driven client outcomes
When information is always readily available, legal strategies are more effective. This has reinforced Gleiss Lutz’s reputation for excellence in client service. “Clients may not see the integration itself, but they experience the results—timely, well-prepared legal outcomes that align with their expectations,” said Geiger. The integrated workflow has also improved collaboration within the firm, allowing legal teams to align more closely with client objectives while delivering superior service.
The Gleiss Lutz team is committed to building on its success by continuously monitoring and optimizing the integrated workflow through internal and client feedback. “We regularly receive positive feedback from our legal reviewers on OpenText eDiscovery,” said Geiger. “They particularly appreciate the intuitive and user-friendly interface of the platform, making it easy to focus on their tasks. The OpenText eDiscovery UI, as well as its functionality, the price point, and the excellent support we receive, continues to swing the pendulum in OpenText’s favor when we compare it with alternatives in the marketplace.”
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