eDiscovery Daily Blog

• June 23, 2017

If you’re in or near my age bracket, you probably remember the similarly titled song by The Beatles (though I actually like the Joe Cocker version better – a rare Beatles re-make that could be argued to be better than the original).  Feel free to debate me on that – after you’ve watched his Woodstock rendition.  Anyway, for any provider working in eDiscovery today (whether law firm or eDiscovery software/service provider), there are instances where working with a partner just makes sense.

The LegalTech News article (Partnering for Success: The Role of the Partnership in Legal Tech, written by Gabrielle Orum Hernández, free subscription required), profiles the expansion of CloudNine’s partner program with our recently announced Alliance Partner Program expansion.  The program allows qualified and approved organizations to enrich the business value and technology competitiveness of their eDiscovery solutions through the integration, referral, and resell of CloudNine software and services.

CloudNine CEO Brad Jenkins told Legaltech News that the partner program is an attempt to leverage some of the strong loyalties and connections that exist within the legal sphere by essentially paying to develop relationships. “Probably the biggest reason [for the partner program expansion] is we have found that in this industry it very much falls into relationship-selling a lot of times,” he said.

The CloudNine Alliance Partner Program consists of three categories of partners:

1. Technology Partners: Data and legal discovery developers who work with CloudNine to develop, integrate, and deploy solutions leveraging CloudNine technology. The business benefit for technology partners is the extension of their capability to access new customers and new markets.
2. Referral Partners: Data and legal discovery consultants and providers who recommend CloudNine software and services to their customers. The business benefit for referral partners is direct compensation for the introduction and acceptance of CloudNine by end users.
3. Channel Partners: Data and legal discovery service providers who sell CloudNine software and services to their customers as part of their portfolio of offerings. The business benefit for channel partners is the ability to resell CloudNine software and services as part of their solutions. CloudNine has long had an extensive channel partner network.

In her article, Hernández mentions several other companies that have made use of the partner model, including kCura (which is a CloudNine technology partner), Neota Logic and HighQ, and Discovia and Brainspace.

In noting that the partnership model allows eDiscovery adjacent companies to offer legal organizations the option of unbundling pieces of their service, Jenkins said “It’s a value-add, a way to meet the needs of the market that’s shifting to the self-service model…What we’ve been able to do is augment the tools that these companies have because now they can still leverage Relativity or their own product, but they have tools like ours which significantly reduce the cost and time of getting those smaller data sets, the day-in, day-out type of projects, in.”

So, if you’re a provider of eDiscovery services today, large or small, sometimes you get by with a little help from your friends.

To schedule a discussion about the CloudNine Alliance Partner Program or to sign up for a free trial of CloudNine’s eDiscovery Platform, contact us at 713.462.3885, info@cloudnine.com, or at cloudnine.com.

BTW, if you’re a member of a solo or small law firm or want to learn how to simplify the discovery process, feel free to check this upcoming webcast!

So, what do you think?  Does your organization work partner with other companies to provide software or services?  As always, please share any comments you might have or if you’d like to know more about a particular topic.

Disclaimer: The views represented herein are exclusively the views of the author, and do not necessarily represent the views held by CloudNine. eDiscovery Daily is made available by CloudNine solely for educational purposes to provide general information about general eDiscovery principles and not to provide specific legal advice applicable to any particular circumstance. eDiscovery Daily should not be used as a substitute for competent legal advice from a lawyer you have retained and who has agreed to represent you.