AI startup by Columbia graduates raises $7 million to target midsize law firms
作者：Niket Nishant
A message reading "AI artificial intelligence", a keyboard, and robot hands are seen in this illustration taken January 27, 2025. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration/File Photo Purchase Licensing Rights, opens new tab
Aug 5 (Reuters) - August, an AI startup founded by Columbia University alumni and that caters to midsize law firms, said on Tuesday it had raised $7 million in a seed funding round led by venture capital firms NEA and Pear VC.
WHY IT MATTERS
AI's ability to handle routine, document-heavy tasks is unlocking new efficiencies for lawyers, particularly because the legal field is built on vast volumes of literature such as case law, contracts and filings.
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By automating time-consuming paperwork, AI platforms such as August are freeing up lawyers to focus on higher-value work.
It also helps to cut costs, a crucial benefit for midsize law firms that lack the resources of their deep-pocketed rivals.
CONTEXT
August was founded in 2023 by Rutvik Rau, Thomas Bueler-Faudree and Joseph Parker, who met at Columbia University.
Besides NEA and Pear VC, the startup secured backing from angel investor Gokul Rajaram, Ramp's vice president of product Geoff Charles, OpenAI's head of engineering David Azose and Bain Capital Ventures partner Kevin Zhang.
The company is based in New York and currently has a team of 12. It expects to expand the workforce to 25 to 30 by the end of the year, Rau told Reuters in an interview.
August operates in a competitive arena dominated by some established players, most notably Harvey, an OpenAI-backed legal AI startup, which caters to elite law firms and big professional services companies.
KEY QUOTES
"The future is one where AI partners with individuals to be a step further than where the industry is today," Rau said.
"We're enabling lawyers to be more productive by eliminating some of the work, so they can actually spend a lot more time working with their clients, understanding their needs and being the strategic value partner for them."
Reporting by Niket Nishant in Bengaluru; Editing by Shilpi Majumdar
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Niket Nishant reports on breaking news and the quarterly earnings of Wall Street's largest banks, card companies, financial technology upstarts and asset managers. He also covers the biggest IPOs on U.S. exchanges, and late-stage venture capital funding alongside news and regulatory developments in the cryptocurrency industry. His writing appears on the finance, business, markets and future of money sections of the website. He did his post-graduation from the Indian Institute of Journalism and New Media (IIJNM) in Bengaluru.
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