Luminance Series B raises $40m for its legal AI document checker

Luminance, the AI-driven legal document checker, has raised $40million in a Series B funding round as it bids to propel global growth and expand its US footprint.

Developed by mathematicians from the University of Cambridge, Luminance was incorporated in 2016 and is now a household name in the world of legal AI.

Its next-generation machine learning is in use with all the ‘Big Four’ accountancy firms, more than one fifth of ‘Global Top 100’ law firms, plus numerous Fortune 500 companies wishing to gain greater insight into their vast datasets and generate enormous time and cost savings.

With a rapidly growing customer base spanning 600 organisations in 70 countries, Luminance brings AI to every touchpoint a business has with its documents, from instantly flagging non-standard clauses in any incoming contract in Microsoft Word and suggesting preferred language, to automatically identifying areas of non-compliance and key terms, obligations and dates in all executed agreements.

The company’s technology has been used in a number of world firsts for AI. For example, in late 2023 during a live demonstration to the BBC, Luminance became the first AI in the world to completely automate the negotiation of a contract, without human intervention, between two opposing parties.

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Luminance was also the first use of AI at London’s highest criminal court, the Old Bailey, where it allowed counsel to cut the time spent reviewing evidence by four weeks.

“The past 12 months have seen huge technical achievements from our Cambridge R&D hub,” said Eleanor Lightbody, CEO of Luminance. “Developments such as ‘Auto Mark-Up’, which brings agreements into line with gold standards in a click, and AI-powered tools for non-legal teams to independently negotiate contracts, make Luminance the most advanced legal LLM [large language model] available today.”

The investment is led by Santa Monica-based growth-stage venture firm, March Capital, with participation from National Grid Partners and other existing investors, including Slaughter and May.

Hyun Koo, partner at March Capital, said: “We invest in AI-native companies solving large, mission-critical problems.

“Given the inefficiencies and complexity that exist today in legal workflows, we immediately saw the potential for Luminance to drive efficiency with its industry-leading LLM.

“Luminance’s breadth of enterprise customers speaks to its capabilities, and we are thrilled to partner with their highly technical and growth-minded team to help build a successful, leading and global legal AI company.”

Sally Wokes, partner at Slaughter and May, said: “As an early investor in Luminance, we have always seen the vision for the technology and the business. AI is having a significant impact on the legal landscape, and it is rewarding to see Luminance having established itself as the leader in the market.”

Ian Cooper, managing director at National Grid Partners, said: “Luminance’s innovative legal LLM and advanced AI assistant shows great promise in being able to relieve contract processing bottlenecks and enhance contract performance monitoring.”

Eleanor Lightbody concluded: “This latest round of funding will help us to bring our technology to new markets, strengthen our foothold in the US where Luminance now generates over one third of its revenue, and solidify our position as the clear market leader in this space.”