AI has every firm asking what to build, what to buy, and what it's worth. We help you find your path the way we always have: by building, testing, and proving it, with decades of experience inside the business of law.
Your knowledge, playbooks, and data are the advantage. Renting a platform to use data you already own is a bigger decision than it looks, and an expensive one. Make it deliberately.
what you give up →The cost of building has collapsed. What once took a platform contract and a year now takes a focused sprint. The hard part is no longer making it. It's knowing what's worth making.
the skills it takes →"Build it (or buy it) and they will come" doesn't work. Introducing Nexlaw Labs: experiments run the right way, built to prove value before you invest.
visit the lab →Help across the whole path: deciding what to build, building the proof, and leading the work while it's underway.
The build, buy, and worth decisions are strategic, not technical. We bring operators who have made these calls before, balancing ambition with reality and pressure-testing the plan before the budget commits.
Senior leadership for the mandate you have now, without the permanent hire. We step in to own AI, product, and technology strategy and to lead innovation and R&D, then hand it off stronger than we found it.
Building is cheap; building well is not. We build working proof on your real scenarios and data, so you can see value before you invest, and operate it professionally when you scale.
Selected writing on strategy, innovation, and the business of law.
Technical debt, data debt, process debt, talent debt. Why firms may be investing in the wrong things for the right reasons.
Partners are your investors. Understanding their incentives is critical to innovation success. Inventors turn cash into ideas; innovators turn ideas into cash.
Innovation shouldn't be a directionless fractal—it's a vector with direction and magnitude. Why most firms innovate for show, not results.
We've been in the C-suite and on the front lines, closing the gap between idea and adoption. We understand how to navigate competing priorities, build consensus, and bridge the distance between strategic planning and practical execution.
Our insights come from building companies, leading teams, and delivering results—not observing or commenting from the sidelines. We've made the hard calls and learned what works (and what doesn't). It's why we run Nexlaw Labs.
We don't hand you a deck and walk away. We work alongside you to get it done, pressure-testing ideas together, helping you move forward with confidence.
Rob has spent his career at the intersection of law and technology, building teams and businesses, leading innovation, and guiding organizations through change and uncertainty. He founded XMLAW (Inc 5000, sold to Thomson Reuters), launched and led SeyfarthLean Consulting, and has worked with Am Law firms, legal tech startups, and private equity sponsors for more than 25 years.
Rob brings perspective that only comes from doing the work in professional partnerships—making the case for investment and delivering on the promise. That experience shapes how Nexlaw Partners works with clients: collaboratively, practically, and with respect for what it takes to succeed.
We take on a small number of engagements with firms, legal tech companies, and investors. If the thinking here maps to a problem you're carrying, let's talk.