Before there was enterprise 2.0 I used to think that, except for utilities like email, most business information-based software such as knowledge management needed to be process aligned. I have softened that position somewhat but for certain tasks, process-aligned remains the key to effectiveness. This is the approach taken by the Clearwell E-Discovery Platform, a product targeted at information-related legal process such as discovery. I recently spoke to Kamal Shah, the Clearwell VP of Products and Marketing, on how this product provides end-to-end process support for – early case analysis, search, cull, review, redaction and production.

Clearwell was founded in 2004 and they are about to release version 5.5 of their eDiscovery product. They now have over 500 customers including Cisco, Constellation Energy, Microsoft, BP and NBC, and they work with 42 business partners. They offer the software directly to enterprises and also sell through business partners who provide Clearwell as a hosted service.  Clearwell provides an appliance based solution that allows for rapid deployment, often in about 30 minutes.

Kamal explained that the industry has adopted an Electronic Discovery Reference Model to promote a common vocabulary and other standards within the space.  Clearwell supports this model and provides a common platform for the various stakeholders in the eDiscovery process including legal, IT, HR, audit, security, and compliance.

Kamal went on to describe the eDiscovery process and how Clearwell supports it. First, there is the initial data collection. Once data is collected, then Clearwell provides pre-processing capabilities. At this stage you also want to understand the task at hand and effectively estimate the cost and duration. Clearwell is able to go after multiple data types and sources to ensure effective retrieval.

Figure 1: Timeline Analytics Quickly Identify Gaps in Collection Across All Data Sources

Next comes the processing. Clearwell has ramped up their processing speed to help with this effort. With the new 5.5 Release, Clearwell can process data at speeds of over 1 terabyte per day and scales to 100 million documents on a single appliance. De-duplication also occurs in this step as you want to reduce the amount of information that your legal counsel, operating at high hourly rates, has to sift through. Part of this is eliminating copies of redundant content such as duplicate files and multiple copies of email forwarded around. At the same time you want to know who knew what and when in these email chains. Clearwell sets them up as a threaded discussion to easily uncover the answers to these questions.

Figure 2: Discussion Threads Identify All Participants and Who Knew What and When

Now comes search and cull down to further refine the content. Usually only 10 to 20% of the content is relevant so you want to get there as efficiently as possible.  You can set up auto-filters to eliminate known false positives such as an article on the topic that was forwarded around but not relevant to the case. Next step is search. A firm might get several hundred keywords  from a government agency such as the SEC or from an opposing litigator. The trick is to provide all of the relevant information and no more. If you provide too much you may be alerting the opposition to potentially damaging information not relevant to the inquiries. Providing too little may result in damaging later discoveries and penalties for failing to properly comply.  Clearwell provides robust keyword and concept search capabilities that help you fulfill the request quickly and easily.

Figure 3: Transparent Search Reduces False Positives of Keyword Search Results

After distilling down the content, Clearwell supports the legal review process with nested folders, decision tree tagging, and indicated related documents. There is a simplified review interface to speed the process. Finally, the post-review production phase is supported through such features as integrated production folders, image based production, custom labeling using headers, footers, and watermarks.

Figure 4: Review Capabilities Allow Users to Quickly Redact Privileged or Confidential Data

Kamal said that the cumulative effect of these process-aligned supports can result in significant costs savings.

Because of the ease of implementation, Clearwell lets potential clients set up test cases to determine their own ROI and this usually results in a new client. I can see why.  It certainly makes to sense to use a product like Clearwell in your enterprise legal processes. This is one situation where process aligned remains a requirement for success.