I am always excited to meet and interview lawyer entrepreneurs who have wonderful stories about their “a-ha” moment — usually a moment of profound frustration while sitting at their desk at work on an assignment. Universally, they describe an interior voice yelling, “There has got to be a better way.” I am especially excited today to be having my first interview with a female legal tech entrepreneur: Nicole Clark, CEO of Trellis.
My conversation with Clark reminded me of a quote from Goethe: “Whatever you do, or dream you can, begin it. Boldness has genius and power and magic in it.” Nicole has no small dreams. She describes her product as the “Google of legal analytics” and proclaims that Trellis “will own the state court data and analytics space” in the future.
Trellis’ website describes their mission as “Democratizing access to the law by making state trial court records and legal data more accessible … [to bring] greater transparency to our judicial system.”
At first glance, it appears that Trellis entered the market to compete with Lex Machina, Thomson Reuters, and Gavelytics, each targeting an aspect of the state court analytics market. However, my discussions with Clark revealed a bold and unique approach to the development of her product, and a unique market strategy, to outwit the long procurement cycle in large law firms.
CEO Nicole Clark and Chief Product Officer Alon Shwartz, the co-founders of Trellis, initially launched in California in early 2018 with $2 million in seed funding. Recently, they expanded coverage to state trial courts throughout New York, Florida, and Texas.
JO: What is what is your vision of Trellis and where does it fit into the legal market?
Read the interview at https://abovethelaw.com/2020/08/meet-lawyer-entrepreneur-nicole-clark-ceo-of-trellis-the-google-of-legal-analytics/
