The executive chair of Beaton Research + Consulting said: ‘Firms put on a brave face about it but it’s hard…There is a tendency for business in Asia to be done by Asians for Asians.’ Sitting on a panel organised by software company Aderant, Dr Beaton also painted a difficult future for the large firms as they are challenged by smaller new entrants. 

No industry is immune

Industry disruption is not confined to the law, he said, pointing also to travel agents, stock brokers and hotels as examples of sectors where established players had been brought to collapse by new entrants who used technology well. ‘No industry is immune,’ he said. ‘Wherever you look it begins with consumers [and] slowly but surely it is coming into corporate law firms.’ Source: Lawyers Weekly