[Part 1] Minimize the Administrative Burden Your Teams Face with AI-Driven Time and Billing

Constant innovation is key to Anaqua’s strategy and with that comes acquisitions, investments, and integrations, all aimed at providing a holistic offering to law firms. As part of the continued investment in both AQX® Law Firm and PATTSY WAVE® as integrated IP practice management solutions, Anaqua recently acquired WiseTime – the leading automated time capture software.

 

We sat down with Domenic Leo, VP and General Manager, Law Firms, and Thomas Haines, VP of WiseTime, to find out more about the recent acquisition of WiseTime.

 

How does the WiseTime acquisition fit into the overall Anaqua law firm strategy?

 

Dom: Since we launched the Law Firm Business, we’ve been focused on connecting the dots in law firms’ IP management processes and providing our clients with industry-leading end-to-end IP management solutions to help law firms manage their businesses effectively. One of the areas we identified as a gap was in time and billing. WiseTime gives law firms the ability to manage their businesses efficiently, obtain time and billing transparency, and better manage their portfolios and clients’ portfolios too.

 

As an AI-driven time and billing solution tailored to IP professionals, WiseTime further expands AQX Law Firm and PATTSY WAVE and enables clients to increase billing by 20%. It gives them back time to focus on their high-value work and reduces time spent on timekeeping and administering billing.

 

Tom: If you look at what's used in the legal sphere, you’ll find that there has been a focus on an important metric: how much should we charge a client for a given piece of work? So, when firms look at their profitability or their productivity, they are often just focused on how much the client was billed.

 

A critical question that can be difficult to answer reliably is how much time, and therefore expense, did we incur to produce the revenue?  To address this, WiseTime generates data of both time cost/spent and time charged/revenue independently.  Hence, WiseTime unlocks the ability to glean the true business profit for a particular piece of work.  Additionally, the autonomous nature of WiseTime (tracking the work you are doing seamlessly without interrupting your workflow) also allows administrative members of the firm to include their time in the equation of measuring both profitability and productivity.

 

How did the initial conversation between the Anaqua and WiseTime teams come about?

 

Tom: Justin Crotty, Chief Operating Officer at Anaqua and I have been in discussions about projects and opportunities since 2019. I was scheduled to travel to Boston to discuss a potential investment in what was an earlier stage version of the company. However, the pandemic upended those plans. Fast-forward two years of conversations and continual innovation and development of the product – WiseTime has reached a level of maturity such that it was an optimal time to restart those discussions.

 

Could you expand on why it was a suitable time to sell WiseTime?

 

Tom: What drives the WiseTime team is the process of creating an excellent product that is intuitive, reliable, and simple for our customers. Our autonomous time and billing product have attracted a growing number of customers through referral and review channels. It became increasingly obvious that WiseTime was approaching a crossroads, where we would need to invest our time and resources in creating a larger infrastructure to support and nurture those customers.

 

We decided that being acquired by an established legal software group was our next logical progression. This would allow us to support the evolving needs our clients face and continue our innovation of the WiseTime platform.

 

Why was Anaqua the right place to accelerate the delivery of your offering to the law firm market?

 

Tom: Anaqua is unique in terms of its record of successfully delivering IP management software to law firms and corporate customers within the IP segment. The value that Anaqua places on continued investment in the innovation and maintenance of its platform set it apart. And the fact everyone at Anaqua has invested their time and resources to bring the WiseTime product and team over to Anaqua is a testament to this.

 

What are you excited about as you look at what’s possible ahead now being part of Anaqua?

 

Tom: We’re very much at the start of a new chapter on the path of making meaningful improvements to productivity at law firms. The management team at WiseTime has a legal background and experience working with law firm clients. We know our time and billing software significantly help in minimizing the administrative burden that law firms face in this area.

 

I'm excited to work with Anaqua’s clients and the opportunities that the integration of WiseTime into AQX® Law Firm and PATTSY WAVE® provides law firms with industry-leading IP practice management solutions.

 

Read part 2 of this interview to learn more.