A new body has been launched in Singapore to coordinate legal technology innovation across 10 countries in the Asia-Pacific region.
The Asia-Pacific Legal Innovation and Technology Association (ALITA) is a regional network that unites over 10 countries in Asia Pacific region with the purpose of driving collaboration in legal innovation and technology in the region.
The association said that it has three main aims: to support legal technology development and education; to help national legal tech associations in their work, and to facilitate collaboration between legal tech associations, regulators, law firms and technology companies.
The association was launched by Justice Lee Seiu Kin, the Singapore Academy of Law's legal technology cluster chair at a conference, TechLaw.Fest, according to the Straits Times.
Singapore law and home affairs minister K. Shanmugam said that innovation can help legal advisors in their work, and open up new areas of legitimate work. Artificial intelligence is one of the areas for innovation, where it is a “rising field where lawful standards have not been worked out," he said.
He said ethical and legal standards must be developed to be clear, consistent and reasonable in order to benefit from the technology.