With the pandemic resulting in a shifting of business priorities, Alternative Legal Service Providers (ALSPs) are having their moment in the sun. One segment that’s rising in prominence is that of flexible lawyers, who are able to provide in-house teams with a high level of expertise at a manageable cost. Players in this segment share with ALB how the pandemic is facilitating their growth, how they are staying competitive, and what the future holds.  

As alternative legal service providers (ALSPs), also known as NewLaw firms, continue growing globally, Japan is witnessing the rise of one segment – contract lawyers for in-house teams.

As alternative legal service providers (ALSPs) become significant competitors within the legal market, clients are increasingly viewing them as a serious standalone option, occasionally in place of traditional law firms.

Since the start of 2019, the Asian region has seen a flurry of NewLaw activity, highlighting that major financial centres like Hong Kong and Singapore are clearly top targets for these providers.

As millennials become an increasingly dominant segment of the workforce, retaining and accommodating and their non-traditional career paths is front of mind for many employers, and law firms are no exception.

Alternative legal service providers (ALSPs), and, in particular, contract lawyer offerings, may have been around in Asia for about a decade, but they have started to really come into prominence in the past year as client demand spikes. And lawyers are beginning to embrace the alternative way as well.