Vincents to leverage AI for legal clients
The firm’s economics and data team has revealed that it is developing data analytic techniques and AI tools ahead of mid-tier accounting firms.
Vincents has announced it wants to further support its legal clients by developing novel data analytics techniques and AI.
The firm said it wanted to make significant developments in the AI space after winning the Innovator of the Year award at the Australian Accounting Awards.
The economics and data analytics team revealed an AI project was being developed that combined the expertise of its accounting professionals, automation, scalable data processing and advanced reasoning over complex datasets.
Vincents’ principal data scientist Dr Josh Arnold said the team initially targeted efficiency when the approach to data analytics was transformed with the development of a suite of AI-enabled document ingestion tools.
The AI tools dramatically reduced the time required to digitise financial statements, bank statements, tax returns and other financial documents for analysis.
“We started by targeting low-hanging fruit. Historically, accountants would manually digitise the hundreds or thousands of hard copy and PDF documents provided by their clients, a process that would take days, before the analysis even begins,” Arnold said.
“Our solutions, which we quickly developed, have allowed various business units to use AI to automatically scan and extract the data from documents and add it to a consistent, readable format, enabling them to do this work in minutes.”
Arnold said that while the big four had invested in their own AI tools, mid-tier firms had taken a more cautious approach to AI use and investment.
The downside of being a smaller online firm with sound technology, Arnold noted, was the lack of industry background and analytical framework to provide the best service for larger, complex issues.
“We are seeing startups offering advisory chatbots which provide 24/7 support for high-level tasks and then allow clients to access a few hours with a real consultant so they can get extra support for issues the chatbot can’t address.”
“Many of the most promising AI startups are coming from domain experts with non-AI backgrounds who have identified real problems in their field and then collaborate with tech specialists to create nice solutions.”
“This is exactly what we’ve been able to do within our Vincents team.”
The firm revealed that efficient document ingestion was only intended as a foundational step in its vision of providing data-driven insights for its legal clients.
Vincents said it recognised that AI combined with the right analytical frameworks could reveal patterns useful as potential case arguments.
The firm’s economics and data analytics director, Hans Weemaes, said trust was the primary focus of the unit’s approach when developing analytical tools.
“Having the ability to rapidly analyse data is now a strategic advantage in terms of generating ideas and minimising case risks,” Weemaes said.
“But as developers and users of this emerging technology we have a responsibility to make sure that AI doesn’t overlook insights, doesn’t generate insights that don’t exist, and doesn’t create ambiguity about how it generates those insights.”
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