LPO is no longer a fad

The availability of outsourcing ventures with world-class resources and expertise is also boosting the growth of outsourcing by legal entities. Legal Process Outsourcing is a lucrative route to reduce cost and increase efficiency by outsourcing legal works to India.

After the Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) and Knowledge Process Outsourcing (KPO), now it’s the Legal Process outsourcing (LPO) that has newly joined the band wagon. Developing nations like India are the hot spot for outsourcing in today’s global marketplace. LPO is being called the next big thing in Indian business. It marks India's climb up the chain of outsourcing jobs from low-end, back-office service functions in call centers to high-value, skilled legal work.
A LPO company basically have law firms and in-house legal departments with legal support services such as document review, due diligence, legal research, accounting and billing and Intellectual Property Services - quickly, efficiently, confidentially and at a very affordable cost.
LPO is no longer a passing phase, the trend has shifted from domestic law firms to an increasingly competitive global marketplace with massive scope and job opportunities. The clock is ticking fast and with time LPOs in India is becoming the most sought after industry to work with. India's leading Legal Process Outsourcing (LPO) Company, pledged to provide Efficient, Effective and Economical Legal Support Services to its global clientele in the current dynamic and competitive global business environment. LPO expertise is utilized by Corporate Bodies, Law Firms, Research Firms and clientele from various other fields. When the outsourced entity is based in another country the practice is sometimes called Offshoring.
LPO outsourcing is not a new phenomenon, LPO started back in 1995 when US based Bickel and Brewer, law firm sent its legal work to its subsidiary in Hyderabad. Earlier many Lawyers in India, USA and UK were unaware of LPO. People came to know about LPO when an LPO’s in India got success and media gave highlights and projections on that. Now many are into LPO sector with the hope of finding better prospect and creating new history in the LPO industry. Most firms and corporations outsource primarily to save cash, and this is considered the biggest advantage for legal outsourcing. While an attorney in major legal markets such as the US may charge from $150–350 dollars/hour when performing rote services, legal process outsourcing firms can often charge a fraction of this. This has attracted major corporations to outsource specific work outside their legal departments, while the developing countries benefit from the huge inflow of income and job creation. So it’s a business where both the ends having its own share of profit that is one of the reasons that’s making this industry grow fast. The latest industry to join the outsourcing rat race is the legal sector. Legal outsourcing has already created 12,000 job opportunities in India alone and this figure is expected to rise to as many as 79,000 by 2015.
The expertise is conscientious in meeting the objectives of its clients with the support of knowledge and qualified cross-functional team of legal practitioners, professionals and scholars. Easy accessibility, prompt and quality service at an economical cost, backed by high degree of Client Confidentiality and Data Security differentiates Acumen from other service providers.
One of the major concerns with legal outsourcing is the potential for breach of clients’ confidentiality. Another concern is that the people performing legal work may not be bound to the necessary ethical standards. However, there have been ethics opinions from various state Bar Associations (New York, San Diego) and recently, the American Bar Association that discuss ethical legal outsourcing and how to achieve it. Because of the sensitive nature of legal work, Indian outsourcing companies have tried to allay the concerns about confidentiality. They have installed closed-circuit televisions, network safeguards and hack-proof servers. Many outsourcing companies in India already have those security measures in place because they have been handling the credit card and banking operations of global companies for more than a decade. Industry members say that outsourcing of legal work to India is a natural next step.
Law school graduates do not have the only option to argue in an Indian court and eventually become an honorable judge. Lawyers, in recent years have understood the mechanics of globalization and economics and this must be the correct time to implement the conception into legal project management as well. LPO is one area where niche legal services outsourcing firms can provide the much needed exposure and experience. The huge sphere of work dealt by such firms gives the lawyers working their opportunities to learn and execute different principles of legal project management. There are multiple success stories in such companies where an individual who joined in as a legal analyst have in short span of time and owing to challenging nature of work has become a leader of big teams of lawyers and paralegal
Gradually the mindset regarding LPO units is changing among the masses. They now comprehend the multi-dimensionality of work done in big LPO companies and are eager to carve their career in such organizations. The industry offers an attractive career path for many of the 300,000 Indians who enroll in law schools every year and make a row for the aspirant to join the LPO and make lot of money.
Presently, there are over 200 LPO’s in India and the number is expected to rise in next few years. The Industry has grown at over 60 percent year on year. According to a research firm, it has been found that legal services outsourcing in India provides the highest cost savings of 44% in comparison to other markets. The research also revealed that LPO services realise the highest profit margin for providers, with an average margin of 29%, ahead of IT (24%), finance and accounting (21%) and procurement (19%). All these figures are indicative of the fact that legal outsourcing is the best avenue to provide cost saving, which in the present state of economic slowdown is the most coveted prize. The research also highlights the expansion plans of LPO service providers that points the increase in business meted out to them. Indian LPO firms are expecting a rise of over 200% in revenue in the past one year. They have experienced amazing rise in litigation, bankruptcy related document drafting and intellectual property infringement work.
Many countries like Philippines, South Africa and China are also looking forward to expand the business in this area but India’s primacy in the business is unlikely to be effected because none of these nations can deliver the kind of scalability that India offers as yet.

The offshoring legal services business in India is still small- annual revenues account for less than 4 per cent of total BPO revenues- but it was among the fastest growing segments of the BPO business. Certainly, that dramatic, growth reduced in 2008 and 2009. But, now, the business is blooming again, that too significantly beyond most companies’ and analysts’ expectations.