Linklaters launches 'Applied Intelligence' team of lawyers and data scientists to co-design bespoke AI-enabled legal solutions for clients' most complex matters
Linklaters has created a new internal team called Applied Intelligence, comprising lawyers and data scientists who will work together to co-design and deliver bespoke AI-enabled technology and legal solutions for clients facing complex, high-stakes challenges. The team is specifically designed for matters involving 'large and complex data sets', building customised AI workflows and tools that go beyond what off-the-shelf commercial products can deliver. Managing Partner Paul Lewis described Applied Intelligence as enabling the firm to meet growing client demand for 'ever more sophisticated solutions powered by AI'. Co-founder Tom Quoroll emphasised that the team has been built for 'collaboration and judgement' as much as technical capability. The move positions Linklaters as an early mover among Magic Circle firms in offering a genuinely integrated lawyer-technologist capability — rather than simply deploying third-party AI tools — and reflects a competitive market in which top-tier clients are increasingly demanding bespoke solutions that combine legal expertise with custom technology development. This story is reported here under the International slot as the best available cross-border/firm strategy story from today's corpus with direct relevance to London-based City firms.
Why this matters
Linklaters' Applied Intelligence team represents a step-change from tool adoption to tool creation — a distinction that matters commercially because bespoke capability is harder to replicate and creates client lock-in. Magic Circle firms competing on AI strategy are increasingly differentiating not by which tools they use, but by whether they can build proprietary solutions for clients' specific legal and data challenges. The 'why now' trigger is client demand: sophisticated financial institution and corporate clients are generating data-intensive legal problems — regulatory investigations, large-scale transactions, complex litigation — that generic AI tools cannot adequately address. Firms that can offer custom-built AI workflows alongside legal advice will capture premium mandates that pure legal advisers cannot.
On the Ground
A trainee supporting the Applied Intelligence team would assist with technology licence review and data processing agreement (DPA) markup for AI tools brought into client matters, contribute to AI governance policy drafting for internal use protocols, and complete vendor due diligence questionnaires for any third-party AI components incorporated into bespoke client solutions.
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