In Patton Boggs’ case, the firm alerted an unnamed client – described as a mid-size investment bank – that a bigger rival was looking to buy out smaller competitors, reports the Washington Post newspaper.

Listening platform

Although the client was not bought out, its executives were impressed with their firm’s knowledge of the potential acquisition attempt. The firm got the inside news from Manzama, a company that tracks developments, new laws and regulations, litigation and social media chatter for law firms’ clients.
According to the report, several top DC firms are paying in the region of $28,000 to $90,000 annually for the service, which describes itself as a ‘listening platform’, but has also been described as a sophisticated version of Google Alerts.

Value proposition

Manzama co-founder, chairman and chief executive Peter Ozolin gave the newspaper an example of the type of potentially crucial market information his business can supply law firms: a plaintiff’s lawyer’s blog post about a workplace claim filed against a local store would be an important slice of information for the defendant’s lawyers.
Commented Mr Ozolin: ‘That would probably not be in the news yet, and wouldn’t show up high on a Google search, so they can get ahead of the issue. We let the lead partner or counsel know there’s something developing.’
Manzama is now understood to be used by around 50 of the top 200 US firms, doubling the amount it worked with at the beginning of the year. Hans Haglund of Patton Boggs told the newspaper that the ‘value proposition for us is staying ahead of any issues our clients may be facing and provide a higher level of services for them’.