The changing landscape of legal discovery within an increasingly electronic world will be the focus of a virtual event on Wednesday, 30 March, featuring insights from renowned Judge Jody Kollapen and legal experts, Terry Harrison and Advocate Ismail Hussain SC.

The session, hosted by LexisNexis South Africa, will also introduce Africa’s first legal text on eDiscovery, entitled A Guide to eDiscovery in South Africa, co-authored by Harrison and Advocate Hussain SC.

In the keynote address, Judge Kollapen will dissect the far reaching and positive impact of technology and innovation on the practice of law. He is Chairperson of the South African Law Reform Commission and wrote the foreword in the new book.

Co-authors Harrison (currently the only independent eDiscovery Consultant in South Africa and wider Africa), and Adv Hussain SC (former Judge of the High Court and Competition Appeal Court), will also unpack how South African lawyers can meet their professional obligations when it comes to eDiscovery, and ensure irrefutable defensibility in the 21st century.

The session will be facilitated by LexisNexis CEO and Chairperson of the Board, Videsha Proothveerajh, who is a firm advocate for advancing the hybridity of lawyers and technology.

“As we navigate the 4th Industrial Revolution, we need to focus on the enhancements not replacements,” she says.

“Holistically speaking, the rise of legal tech is here and is aimed at efficiencies and cost optimisations. Technologies including eDiscovery have the effect of reducing the amount of time required to process cases and, as their use increases, we should see a concomitant decrease in the unit cost of providing legal services.”

Those who register for the virtual session can look forward to critical discussion around important concepts such as: 

• What eDiscovery is, why we need it, how it affects dispute resolution and the risks and dangers of ignoring it
• Using eDiscovery to reduce research and case preparation time
• The many features of eDiscovery technology
• Globally acknowledged eDiscovery best practices (collection, processing, review and production of documents stored in electronic format)

EVENT DETAILS

Date: 30 March 2021

Time: 10.00am

Register here: https://relx.zoom.us/j/97765162258

A Guide to eDiscovery in South Africa (ISBN 9780639012629) is available for back-order from the LexisNexis online bookstore, with print copies expected to be available from the end of March 2021.

The authors make a compelling case for both the wider adoption of eDiscovery by the legal fraternity, and the need for South Africa to have the practice of eDiscovery incorporated into our rules of civil procedure. The book takes a practical and understandable look at the manner in which litigators must now collect, review, and produce evidence, considering how the very nature of what constitutes information and documentary evidence, types and sources, and how they are dealt with, has changed.