Luminance, the market-leading artificial intelligence (AI) platform for lawyers, continues to strengthen ties in the legal profession by creating an Advisory Board to accelerate the adoption of this technology, essential for law firms and in-house teams to stay competitive in response to the pressures on the industry.

The board is comprised of senior lawyers from a range of specialisms, jurisdictions and organisations, complementing the work of the Security Advisory Board, led by Lord Evans of Weardale KCB, former Director General of MI5:

• Rosemary Martin, Group General Counsel of Vodafone;

• Steve Cooke, Senior Partner of Slaughter and May;

• Manuela Cavallo, Founding Partner of Portolano Cavallo; and

• Vagn Thorup, Former Chairman of the International Bar Association’s (IBA) Technology Committee.

Luminance’s continued investment in recruiting the best of the best within the profession to support its growth demonstrates the company’s commitment to offering an exemplary suite of products to its ever-expanding global customer base, which includes over 165 law firms and organisations working in more than 80 languages.

Emily Foges, CEO of Luminance said: “The insider knowledge that these industry specialists bring will ensure that we intrinsically understand the requirements of our customers so we can continue to provide technology that supports them.”

The board will advocate for the positive impact AI technology has on the legal profession and provide expert advice and guidance on the adoption of AI in law firms and organisations.

Rosemary Martin, Group General Counsel of Vodafone, said: “I am delighted to be joining Luminance’s Advisory Board. The company is at the leading edge of the legal sector’s digital transformation: a transformation that should improve legal services and access to justice and make lawyers’ work more enjoyable and valuable.”

Steve Cooke, Senior Partner of Slaughter and May, added: “The legal profession needs to engage the brightest minds. Luminance’s technology offers that opportunity, allowing lawyers to be the trusted advisors they trained to become.”

Manuela Cavallo, Founding Partner of Portolavo Cavallo, said: “I believe that AI is the biggest ongoing change for the legal sector and Luminance will be instrumental in onboarding the vast legal community into the future. I am very excited to be part of the Advisory Board leading the change into the newest frontier of the legal sector.”

Vagn Thorup, Former Chairman of the IBA’s Technology Committee, added: “Being part of this leading next-generation technology, joining the Advisory Board and helping to bring Luminance to the next level as a company is a privilege and will be great fun.”

Luminance launched in September 2016 and has over 165 customers in more than 40 countries across six continents. The company was recently named a ‘Technology Pioneer’ by the World Economic Forum and received a Queen’s Award for Enterprise in the Innovation category.

About Rosemary Martin

Rosemary Martin was appointed Group General Counsel and Company Secretary of Vodafone Group Plc in March 2010. She previously served as CEO of the Practical Law Group, having spent 11 years with Reuters Group Plc with the last five years as Group General Counsel and Company Secretary. Before joining Reuters, Rosemary was a partner in the City law firm, Rowe & Maw (now Mayer Brown). Rosemary is a member of The Takeover Panel and a trustee of Vodafone Foundation and Lloyd’s Register Foundation and has previously held non-executive roles at EY and HSBC Bank Plc.

About Steve Cooke

Steve Cooke is the Senior Partner of Slaughter & May. He headed the Mergers and Acquisitions practice from 2001 to 2016. He has a general corporate and M&A practice, with particular experience in takeover bids and other Stock Exchange related work. Steve acts for a number of listed companies including FTSE 100 clients Aviva, Barratt Developments, BAT, Centrica, Diageo, Hikma Pharmaceuticals, International Airlines Group, Rolls-Royce and WPP and FTSE 250 clients Aggreko, Big Yellow Group, Merlin Entertainments, Morgan Advanced Materials, Sophos and Spectris. He is the author of Takeovers (1997) and is a non-executive director of PRS for Music.

About Manuela Cavallo

Manuela is one of the founding partners of Portolano Cavallo. Manuela advises domestic and international clients on corporate governance matters on mergers and acquisitions, and joint ventures transactions, as well as Private Equity and Venture Capital, in particular with respect to transaction in the Fashion and of digital, media and technology sectors. She also advises clients on aspects relating to acquisition finance in M&A transactions. She is one of the few women to have been identified among the top attorneys in Italy in the Corporate/M&A sector in recent years by Chambers & Partners, Who’s Who Legal and Legal500, in particular in relation to cross-border and multi-jurisdictional operations.

About Vagn Thorup

Vagn’s primary fields of expertise are mergers and acquisitions, company law, joint ventures, general commercial law matters and technology law. Vagn has for a number of years consistently been ranked in the top five of the most influential corporate board members in Denmark in the annual survey published by the Danish equivalent of the FT, Børsen. Vagn serves on the boards of several businesses, many of which have significant foreign-based activities. Vagn has also served as Chairman of the IBA Technology Committee and as a Council Member of IBA’s Legal Practice Division (LPD).

About Luminance

Luminance is the leading artificial intelligence platform for the legal profession. The technology builds on ground-breaking machine learning and pattern recognition techniques developed at the University of Cambridge to read and understand legal language much like the human brain. Luminance is used by law firms and in-house teams in over 40 countries around the world to improve processes such as due diligence, compliance reviews, property portfolio analysis and eDiscovery. Luminance has offices in London, Cambridge, New York, Chicago and Singapore.