StartUp Circle: How has LegalKart built a network for lawyers and legal practitioners across India?

LegalKart is India’s first mobile app downloadable from the Android play store and Apple App Store for all legal professionals. It’s a practice management software for lawyers where they can build their Legal Practice and manage clients, cases and financials. The app automates manual processes to make it more efficient and swifter.

LegalKart strives to bring a paradigm shift for all practising lawyers by leveraging cloud computing technology. LegalKart an ideal app for all new & experienced lawyers because it helps new lawyers to get exposure to potential clients, free access to millions of judgments and experienced lawyers can manage all their cases, clients, calendars.

Q. How did you come up with the idea?

Every challenge that we face is a hidden opportunity. In my 12 years of professional experience with various corporations, I experienced serious challenges due to unavailability of legal professionals in different parts of the country and sometimes at international destinations too. That feeling when you can see that the problem is obvious but there is no solution available inspired me to explore possible solutions. I was able to visualize the challenge as a third person and identified the key bottlenecks with the help of my founding partner and LegalKart CTO Partha Sen by using appropriate technology solutions. The only objective we had in our minds was to create access to a reliable legal professional on-demand and this led to the concept of LegalKart.

Q. How does your platform work?

LegaKart is not a legal service provider nor it solicits any kind of legal services but it is a technology platform that facilitates legal service providers through its technology to manage their legal practice.

LegalKart uses artificial intelligence to connect qualified clients to the lawyers helping them to build and grow their practice. A first of its kind in India wherein a lawyer can manage its cases, clients, team and finances at one place; majority lawyers on LegalKart are using its unique features like voice notes, live case updates, lawyers collaborative network, client connect and one-click financial management. Lawyers on LegalKart are providing all kind of legal support and services to their clients including case support, legal advice, documentation etc.

Q. What were the challenges and How did you overcome them?

In India, legal technology penetration is much lower as compared to developed economies like US & Europe and when an individual or a business needs legal help there are basic challenges like access and identifying an appropriate Lawyer for them. Similarly, for Lawyers, it is difficult to connect with new clients and manage their legal practice efficiently. LegalKart is solving the problem of access for individuals and business by creating a connect with Lawyers using LegalKart Practice Management App. We have seen positive traction in this ecosystem and now scaling the solution to reach to masses.

Q. How did you build the core team (co-founders and initial employees)?

The core team is the heart & soul of a company and I feel immensely fortunate to have Partha Sen as CTO & Founding Partner and Deepak Prajapati as Chief Strategy. Partha comes with 22 Years of technology development experience and he is a passionate perfectionist for the technology he builds. With Global tech experience, Partha leads technology at LegalKart. Deepak is an IIT Bombay topper and serial entrepreneur leading Business Strategy at LegalKart. Recently Malay Mandal joined LegalKart as Chief of Growth who is an FMS Delhi graduate & have more than 19 years of experience in leading growth and marketing function.

Q. What has been your business growth till now?

In less than a year of its launch, LegalKart has more than 4500+ Lawyers in 450 cities and districts in India. On a monthly basis now we are able to cater more than 5000 individuals & this is growing 25% MoM. We have some of the biggest corporates and thousands of MSMEs & Startups using LegalKart tech solution for their legal matters on a daily basis.

Q. What is the one thing that sets you apart from your competitors?

In India, as we are talking more than 95% legal sector is unorganized and out of 15 Lakh registered legal professionals only 3-4% are using any kind of technology. With this backdrop, all the currently available legal assistance technologies are focused on 4% of the current tech users in all metro cities.

LegalKart is focusing on the rest of the 95% untapped legal professionals & building technology solutions to cater them & bring them to mainstream technology usage. Easy to use interface, availability of all legal forums, vernacular language integration & local client connect are some of the striking features which are making LegalKart unique in its endeavour. With its reach in more than 450 cities, LegalKart made its inroads in the entire tier I, II & III cities.

Q. How are you funded? (Funding details till date)

In the month of October 2019, we received a seed funding of 3.5 CR. The angels who have invested in their personal capacity include Pranay Jivrajaka (CEO, FoodPanda), Mitesh Shah (CFO, BookMyShow), Sundeep Sahni (CCO, Rocket Internet), Pallav Singh (ex-COO, OlaCabs), Sudarshan Gangrade (CEO, Lo! Foods), and other individual HNIs from Microsoft, Cognizant, Tata Motors, METRO Cash & Carry India, and Oracle, who are based in the USA, the UK, Japan, and the UAE.

Q. What are your future plans?

We at LegalKart would like to metamorphose into a self-sustaining legal-tech ecosystem and like today taxi means Ola, a few years down the line LegalKart means reliable access to legal service and support. In short to medium term we are pushing technology awareness & sensitization among all the independent practising lawyers & investing our time & money in creating access to a reliable legal professional for masses. We aim to be present in more than 1500 cities with more than 25000 lawyers on our platform in the next two years.

Detailed profile of Founder and Co-Founder of LegalKart

Founder & CEO - Dr Arvind Singhatiya

Dr. Arvind Singhatiya is the tour de force behind LegalKart, leading the organization as its Founder & CEO. He is an alumnus of National Law University Jodhpur & awardee of Honorary Doctorate in the field of Management by Young Scientists University, California.

Arvind is a seasoned professional with an experience of more than a decade, working with corporate giants like Essel Group, Ola Cabs, MetroCash & Carry, ACME SOLAR, FICCI etc.

The core idea was to create an ecosystem of legal service supply connected with its demand using technology. Legalkart app is the first product in the series to enable all legal professionals to manage their law office & practice on it. LegalKart client App is also available to download from the Play & App Store enabling every individual to not only manage its current cases but also connect with a Lawyer.