Reflecting on ABA Techshow 2019

By Lauren Dagworthy

‍March 13, 2019

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It’s been almost two weeks since the Soluno team wrapped up our second visit to the ABA Techshow. We wanted to take a moment to record our thoughts on the event while it’s still fresh in our minds.

First, we were very excited to unveil our new display booth at the show this year. Since the ABA Techshow in 2018, our company and our product have grown significantly, and our booth doubled in size this year as a result. This year our space was able to accommodate all our visitors, and provide an engaging experience with our company and with Soluno. The team was energized by everybody who took time to attend our booth and chat about legal accounting. The enthusiasm of the Techshow attendees has already helped us power through these last weeks of winter and really dive into the production of new features and integrations.

This year at the Techshow we decided to forgo the free booth giveaways and opted to donate $2 to the ABA Fund for Justice and Education for every business card that was given to our representatives. Through all our interactions and the generosity of Techshow attendees, Devlos Software is proud to be donating $270.00 to the ABA FJE. An extra thank you should be extended to all those who supported the FJE’s mission to close the justice gap.

The ABA Techshow is always a high point in Devlos’s year simply because we always take just as much out of the experience as we put into preparing for it. Here are a few of our key takeaways from this year's conference:

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Lots of emphasis on case and contact management

The ABA Techshow seemed to be full of software companies looking to streamline and simplify case and contact management for law firms. The trend towards software adding more insight/analytics to their suite of capabilities (especially with the rise of A.I. technology) was hard to ignore. It seems to be received with a lot of enthusiasm in an age of saving time and maximizing output!

"Business of Law" solutions don’t seem to have changed dramatically

In fact, we were shocked to learn that some vendors are moving away from legal accounting features entirely and are focusing more on case and contact management. The apparent lack of acceleration over the last few years in legal accounting solutions means that there are a lot of feature gaps to fill and room to further develop and innovate.

Cloud solutions are (still) rising in popularity

This didn’t come as too much of a shock to us. The Techshow featured many Cloud-based products offering numerous advantages to law firms. While many attendees were actively seeking these products, there were also many who were looking for the same modern features on-premise. Unfortunately, there didn't seem to be many innovative options available to on-premise firms. Moving forward, flexible products that run on either platform would certainly catch the eye of a broader range of clients.

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Office 365 continues to dominate

When it comes to productivity, Office 365 not only takes the cake; it takes the cookies and muffins, too. With its full connectivity and ability to integrate with many crucial programs for law firms, Office 365 has little competition in the productivity world. It seems Office is the catalyst for powerful integrations; for example take our friends at NetDocuments. By integrating with both Soluno and Office 365, NetDocuments has taken a huge step towards having a truly integrated Cloud-based system. Even Google's suite of tools doesn't seem to be challenging Office's dynasty any time soon.

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From the vendors, to the attendees, to the city of Chicago, we had a fantastic second ABA Techshow experience. All in all, seeing the trends within the industry and making meaningful connections with other vendors will ultimately lead to bigger and better things for Soluno in the future. We've already got our booth booked for next year - see you all in 2020!

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