Lawyers and techies launch DLT contracts tool

A new distributed ledger technology (DLT) network is launching to streamline the design and administration of legal contracts.

Created by law firms BakerHostetler, LegalBono and ErdosIP, with technology companies Clause, Crowdcube, LexPredict, Libra, Mattereum, Monax, Rymedi, TransparentNode and Wolfram Blockchain Labs, the Agreements Network aims to redefine how legal products and services support the networked economy.

Lawyers and companies can design and operate contracts to perform legal jobs, such as contract management and collecting, storing and proving evidence. They can also track information such as chain of custody for assets and create new products for legal contracting.

The founding participants will collaborate to validate, refine and test the technology, and enable the adoption of legal product solutions geared to meet demand for legal smart contracts. The products execute simple legal functions automatically at the network level and can be marketed and sold across a global peer-to-peer network.

“As the world moves ever further down the path of digitisation the legal functions of most businesses are being forced to migrate and update their systems,” says Casey Kuhlman, CEO of Monax.​ “This is, fundamentally, a good thing. It will eventually reduce errors, increase certainty, decrease risk, and streamline operations at a core level.”