Shamnad Basheer Prize Winner, 2018

The Problem

The legal sector, just like the health sector, faces a data problem. The primary data – laws, regulations, cases, court data and forms – is scattered across different places and structured in different ways. This creates a huge problem when one is seeking to use this data in any way, whether it is making accessible case data for lawyers and citizens, court data for lawyers, case planning data for judges and courts, judicial performance data for the justice system, or forms and tools for citizens. As a result our systems of law and justice do not function with as much efficiency, transparency, accountability, and intelligence as they could. 

Idea:

Provakil is bringing the latest thinking in data sciences and management to build a data-driven enterprise that can then address different use-cases through separate apps. Its founders have dealt with challenges in other sectors, notably health, where data needs to be dependably aggregated from different sources, reconciled, and then directed to specific user needs. While they are currently creating solutions focused on practicing lawyers and on law firms and legal departments they have also executed projects to demonstrate how court data can be utilised to make courts more efficient. 

Their significant innovation is in focusing on the data core itself, i.e., the processes and structures to source and manage data in such a way that it is highly usable in different situations. This is noticeably different from players who are focusing on specific solutions such as a court listing app for litigating lawyers, or case databases for research, but not building a underlying data architecture that is robust and versatile enough to create integrated solutions that address multiple needs of clients such as a solution that can show court listings, enable search and analysis of cases, show data related to specific judges and courts, and provide practice management tools. 

In a world of specialists, Provakil understands that data is a specialisation by itself that will enable a multitude of other specialist services. With a strong tech, data, and legal background in the founding team makes them a strong contender for the organisation that delivers data-driven solutions to the industry and systems.