Son Suhyeok, CEO of Loyard, "Complementing the Legal Market's Specificity through Digitalization"
Analyzing Judgments to Predict Sentences and Derive Similar Cases
[Asia Economy Reporter Kim Jong-hwa] #At a law firm office in Gangnam, Seoul, a lawyer finishes a consultation and mutters, "I should have doubled the consultation fee..." trailing off. A colleague retorts, "Are you really that oblivious?" This exchange happened after they belatedly noticed the luxury handbag carried by the woman who had just left the consultation.
The legal services market operates on a non-fixed pricing system. Without clear grounds or standards for costs, the price is essentially "whatever is asked." This remains the reality of the domestic legal market.
A convenient way to predict sentencing and estimate the cost of needed legal services has emerged. The legal tech startup "LAWlRED," which offers AI-powered sentencing prediction services and a lawyer work transaction platform called "Bokdaeri."
LAWlRED provides sentencing predictions through its namesake service launched in September last year. It analyzes over 10,000 rulings per crime type, finds similar precedents, and offers information such as expected sentencing, estimated time for first trial rulings, highest similar rulings, and harshest penalties. It does not simply calculate the average sentence for all cases but considers numerous variables to find precedents matching the user's individual situation.
Currently, case analysis results are provided free of charge. Viewing four similar precedents incurs a fee of about 5,000 KRW per case. Jurisdiction courts, case numbers, and rulings can be viewed, but personal information such as real names and addresses are not displayed.
At present, services cover only two crime types: drunk driving and sexual assault. From February, fraud services will be added, and in March, drug crime services will be introduced. As the service areas expand, it is expected to eradicate chronic issues in the legal market that relied on intuition or former officials.
Son Su-hyuk, CEO of LAWlRED, said, "The domestic legal market lacks grounds and standards for legal service costs," adding, "LAWlRED's service can be called digital legal services, improving legal services through digital technology and complementing the industry's unique characteristics."
On the Bokdaeri platform, the standard price for 'court appearance representation' has settled at 100,000 KRW per case. This fee covers attending the 'one-minute trial' at district courts, where a lawyer's presence is mandatory, and paying the local lawyer entrusted with the legal procedure.
As of this month, about 2,000 lawyer members are active on the Bokdaeri platform. Last year, transactions amounted to approximately 400 to 500 million KRW annually.
CEO Son analyzed, "In civil lawsuits, about 70-80% are handled directly by the parties without lawyers," adding, "If the opaque and inefficient legal service prices drop to reasonable levels, these consumers will hire lawyers, and the legal market can grow further."
Son's intention is not only to reduce legal service prices but also to narrow sentencing disparities. He said, "Depending on the judge's discretion, the same crime can result in a huge gap of 1 to 5 years," adding, "AI can reduce such disparities through repetitive data learning, and judges can greatly benefit from referring to LAWlRED."
Trials involving just the two crimes for which LAWlRED provides or is preparing sentencing prediction services?drunk driving and fraud?amount to 500,000 cases annually. LAWlRED's goal is to datafy 70% of these trials and become the Naver of the legal market.
CEO Son said, "Tesla is an AI technology company. LAWlRED is also a company with AI technology," adding, "Just as people search on Naver when they have questions, we want people to look to LAWlRED when they have legal questions."
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