K&L Gates Premier eDiscovery Practice Group Jumps to Reed Smith

Migrated from eDJGroupInc.com. Author: Greg Buckles. Published: 2011-05-17 17:50:22  This has been the year for corporations shifting to eDiscovery readiness. By contrast, we have seen few big announcements from the AmLaw firms regarding large technology investments, hiring industry personalities or building out eDiscovery practice areas. Today’s articles from The AmLaw Daily and Law.com have put law firm eDiscovery back on my radar. David R. Cohen, leader of K&L Gates eDiscovery practice group has moved to Reed Smith’s Pittsburgh office and has taken 14 attorneys and staffers with him. The K&L Gates eDiscovery Analysis and Technology (e-DAT) Group currently lists 42 professionals, but I am guessing that the 30% actually represens the core of dedicated, experienced personnel. Going back in time to the big Microsoft anti-trust cases, this practice group reflected Preston, Gates & Ellis’s (the original firm as I knew them) dedication to never lose a case based on technology or eDiscovery process. The groundbreaking analytic review interface named Attenex was created by the firm and later sold to FTI. The e-DAT group used Attenex to manage large matter reviews. This background should help you understand the impact of the jump to Reed Smith.Beyond the practice group, K&L Gates also ran the largest free online collection of eDiscovery caselaw at Electronic Discovery Law site. I hope that the remaining practice group will be able to maintain it or that the firm would consider transferring it to an academic body like EDRM.net or The Sedona Conference. We need more independent sources of eDiscovery caselaw and news. It was encouraging that a law firm (which some would call a service provider) would take it upon themselves to maintain such a public resource free of charge – especially since many eDiscovery people charge for even the simplest level of information. Too often, provider marketing groups are tempted to cherry pick decisions that validate their offerings and differentiators. After all, that’s their job. Our job is to examine the source and possible bias of information before we blindly accept it at face value. The movement of the core eDiscovery practice group puts one of our clean, free information sources at potential risk. The value of the eDiscovery Case Database lies in the human expertise that filtered, categorized and commented the case summaries. This is the same value proposition that we have tried to bring to you through our News/Blog collection engine. Cutting through the noise so that you can find what matters. I wish David Cohen and his team the best of luck at Reed Smith and hope that they will continue their contributions to the larger eDiscovery community.