Litera’s acquisition strategy feels a bit like a good Thanksgiving plate — a variety of different components piled together to create one satisfying feast. Just in time for the holiday, the company announced this morning that it’s adding a helping of Office & Dragons, a UK-headquartered document automation company.
The grand plan at Litera has been clear for a while: own the entire legal workflow. From acquiring Kira Systems to streamline contract review, to BigSquare for financial and business intelligence, the company has steadily built a one-stop shop for law firms. Office & Dragons joins a long list of providers brought under the Litera roof — and more importantly brought into its vision of the attorney workflow. At this rate, I should dust off my phony “generative AI-enabled, quantum-secured data compliance solution” startup to see if Litera might accidentally buy it just to cover every possible base for their clients.
Office & Dragons promises up to 97% time savings serving diverse practice areas (Private Equity, Litigation, Real Estate — you name it).
Always knew Tom Bombadil was up to something.
Office & Dragons streamlines document intensive work, from making mass edits to entire suites of diverse documents with one click to quickly spinning out suites of documents for a particular deal type with forms, templates, precedents, or even highly negotiated, bespoke agreements. The product also provides mass redlining and collaborative editing capabilities.
There’s a delicate balance in the legal tech space between providing a product that will save lawyers time and providing a product that will rob lawyers of billable hours. But the work targeted by Office & Dragons frees up that magical breed of wasted time that both the client doesn’t want to pay for and the lawyer doesn’t even particularly want to bill. That’s the sweet spot for selling tech to an attorney.
Founder and CEO Samuel Smolkin is optimistic about the move, citing the growth opportunities afforded by Litera’s resources. As he put it, “With integrations spanning Compare, Kira, Transact, and beyond, we aim to make Office & Dragons an essential part of every lawyer’s toolkit—helping them save hours of repetitive work, focus on higher-value tasks, and improve their quality of life.” Litera CEO Avaneesh Marwaha captured this vision succinctly, noting that the acquisition reflects Litera’s “ongoing commitment to expand our portfolio with mission-critical tools that integrate with native attorney workflows.”
You might say with this deal, Litera has rolled a natural 20! Ugh. No, you wouldn’t be that nerdy. Let’s just say they’ve truly won the Game of Thrones this time. By George, that’s arguably worse. Wait, the “George” in that expression is also a dragon reference! Anyway, this deal will certainly help Litera tip the scales for its customers. Oh, I give up.
Joe Patrice is a senior editor at Above the Law and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer. Feel free to email any tips, questions, or comments. Follow him on Twitter or Bluesky if you’re interested in law, politics, and a healthy dose of college sports news. Joe also serves as a Managing Director at RPN Executive Search.
