In 2024, we wrote a blog post detailing a few major AI trends we were seeing in the legal space. After decades of slow tech adoption, it was clear that the legal industry was going to be proactive in adopting AI solutions. In a crowded landscape, we’ve looked for companies rethinking the most complex and consequential legal workflows from first principles.

And now, we are thrilled to introduce our investment in one of those legal AI applications we consider potentially transformative: Bench IQ*.

Bench IQ’s founders blend both a deep technical and legal DNA: CEO Jimoh Ovbiagele and CTO Max Isakov previously pioneered one of the first legal AI tools at ROSS Intelligence, while CCO Jeff Gettleman spent two decades litigating bankruptcies as a partner at Kirkland & Ellis. Jeff was looking for a leg up in court that would allow him to tailor his argument and strategies specifically to how a judge thinks – a task he knew would be prohibitively time-consuming and costly without the help of AI. Coupled with Jimoh’s and Max’s experience at ROSS Intelligence, the three set out to challenge the status quo for preparation, strategy, and confidence in the courtroom.

The need is clear. Selective legal publication rules result in the majority of judicial opinions going unpublished across the Court of Appeals and U.S. District Courts. As a result, lawyers don’t have access to the judicial reasoning and background that can be extremely informative to them as they try future cases before the same judges. Bench IQ replaces hunches and memory recall with hard intelligence and tailored insights.

Already, four of the top five Am Law 200 firms rely on Bench IQ when the stakes are highest, because understanding how a judge tends to rule can tilt an argument from persuasive to winning. It’s not just about shaving hours off research; it’s about showing litigators possibilities they haven’t had before.

We’re excited to be co-leading Bench IQ’s $5.3M seed financing round alongside Inovia Capital to arm litigators with the kind of intelligence that could decide lawsuits worth billions of dollars.