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Manthan featured Exclusively in the Business Review
The online article can be found here
Merging your business with another company? Suing your competitor? Signing a lease on office space? In the coming years, there's a big chance someone in India will prepare your deposition or review your contract.
Legal process outsourcing, or LPO, is gaining momentum among large corporations and law firms as companies increasingly look to cut costs and work for clients seven days a week, 24 hours a day.
According to the American Bar Association Journal, there are about 100 LPO companies in India and the legal outsourcing industry there is estimated at $80 million per year. The industry is expected to reach $4 billion by 2015. "It's still a new trend for the legal profession," says attorney Jason Epstein, chair of Baker, Donelson, Bearman, Caldwell & Berkowitz PC's business and technology group and a shareholder in the law firm. "Multi-national corporations have been outsourcing for other purposes. LPO is the next service India is providing. It's a revolutionary step in our profession."
Baker Donelson, Memphis' largest law firm, is currently performing extensive research to find the right LPO company in India and company officials plan to travel there this winter to perform due diligence, Epstein says. "It's unwise to outsource without due diligence," he says. "We would never consider doing a deal until we feel comfortable, until we can put Baker Donelson's stamp of approval on it. Our reputation is on the line." LPO is driven by cost savings, Epstein says, with American law firms realizing savings of 60%-90%, depending on the type of legal work performed.
"We'll be at a serious disadvantage if we don't step in," he says about utilizing LPO. "The question is to what extent." Indian LPO firms provide services for a large spectrum of practice areas, from personal injury and medical malpractice to corporate law and immigration. Bangalore, India-based Manthan Legal, for example, provides several types of services in more than 10 areas of the law, including drafting of pleadings, legal research, discoveries and deposition summaries, says Gururaj Potnis, director of parent company Manthan Services .
Manthan provides business process management services to companies in the legal, retail and market research domains. Manthan Legal works with more than 85 law firms across the U.S., providing them with legal and paralegal services.
Jobs that are done in-house for $300-$500 an hour can be done by Manthan for $100-$200 an hour, Potnis says. In addition, Manthan's 160 lawyers and 130 paralegals are working when their American peers are asleep, he says.
"There are so many activities that can be done when the U.S. office is closed," Potnis says. "Drafting of pleadings, motions and deposition summaries can be done any time." Says Epstein, "It's absolutely a consideration for us." Manthan assists with administrative, paralegal and legal work and its employees, who were educated in India, are not licensed to work in the U.S., nor are they licensed in any specific state. Potnis says they don't need to be.
"We don't provide legal advice or legal opinion and hence are, in principle, only a legal support firm," he says. However, Potnis says Manthan employs U.S. attorneys who oversee its legal support work. "They bring in the expertise and drive quality and training initiatives at Manthan," he says.
Manthan's employees undergo a 15-week training program that includes the U.S. legal systems, but he admits that doesn't replace years of law school. "We can never replace experienced attorneys," he says. "We only do standard procedures."
Not all the ethical issues of outsourcing legal work to India have been explored thoroughly, says attorney Lucian Pera, an Adams and Reese LLP partner who represents law firms on legal issues and professional responsibility.
First and foremost, client confidentiality is defined differently in the U.S. and in India, with attorney-client privilege in India encompassing a "narrower duty of confidentiality than the duty in the U.S.," according to The Professional Lawyer, an ABA publication.
"It's a little unnerving," Pera says. "I'm not sure that we can legally bind Indian attorneys to our rules." He says confidentiality agreements may be signed, but he's unsure whether they're enforceable and where. "There are all kinds of issues surrounding international confidentiality agreements," he says. "I haven't yet seen any analysis that makes me comfortable."
Another ethical issue is putting your name on the work of lawyers and paralegals in India. "Supervision problems are worse when it's thousands of miles away," Pera says.
Off-shoring jobs to India has also been widely criticized in the U.S., as jobs that once were on American payrolls are shifting abroad. "Baker Donelson is keeping whatever work we can in the U.S.," Epstein says. The law firm this year has added 88 attorneys nationwide. Epstein says cost savings, which are passed on to clients, are increasingly demanded by clients and that it is Baker Donelson's duty to explore them. But the pressure to be as efficient as possible has led some legal and paralegal services to be "commoditized," he says. "The whole landscape, all practice areas are considered."
About Manthan
Manthan Services is a highly specialized legal outsourcing firm which extends Legal, Paralegal and Secretarial Services to a large number of In house Legal Counsels and law firms in United States, Canada and United Kingdom, including several Legal 500 firms. Headquartered in the Silicon Valley of Asia - Bangalore, India, with offices in the United States and United Kingdom, Manthan is strategically placed to deliver on all your outsourcing needs, acting as an extension of your firm. For more information about Manthan Services, please visit www.manthanlegal.com.
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