Book a time with our legal AI experts for a personalized demo of our autonomous agents. The demo itself only takes 15 minutes and you can deep dive into the use cases most relevant for you, whether it's drafting SoWs, reviewing NDAs, or completing infosec forms.
Simmons & Simmons build on Flank
WatchHow Simmons & Simmons put agents in production. Three minutes with Lucy Shurwood, Partner.
01 · The firm
The building is where Simmons pulls ahead.
An international firm of more than 1,000 lawyers across 23 offices, which calls its approach to AI “build and buy.” The buying is what every firm of its size now does. Its Applied AI team, the firm's legal engineering function, is led by partner Lucy Shurwood and builds agents on Flank for the firm's own lawyers and for the firm's clients.
1,000+
lawyers across the firm
23
offices
2025
working with Flank since, across UK and Middle East practices
4
example workflows built by the firm's own team, across drafting and review
“It's no longer about how many hours the lawyers work. It's more about what they achieve with that agentic service and what the outputs are for clients.”
Lucy ShurwoodPartner, Simmons & Simmons
02 · The problem
Where document automation stops.
Answer a questionnaire and a template assembles itself, the same way every time. That holds until what arrives does not fit the questionnaire. The firm's hardest drafting turns on who sent the instructions, and on input no questionnaire has a box for.
General assistants do not close the gap either. One stops reading reliably around sixty pages; Simmons routinely works past ninety. The agents sit in that gap: they read what arrives, apply the firm's positions, and ask when something is missing.
“Every tool has its strengths, but Flank applies Simmons know-how directly within the document review process, helping us work more efficiently without changing how we work.”
Ali ChaudhrySenior Legal Engineer, Simmons & Simmons
03 · The workflows
Four example workflows, built by the firm's own team.
Between them they have saved hours and unlocked new productivity gains. The hardest of them needed a capability that did not exist when the firm asked for it.
The agentInputOutput
Securitisation review, for a global banking clientTransaction documents past ninety pages, and the checklist the lawyers already work fromThe documents marked up, and a table of what needs a lawyer's eyeLive
Complex drafting, from unstructured inputSource data with no two laid out alike, and the firm's standard templateThe template filled, and a question to the sender wherever something is missingLive
Complex drafting, from the playbookThe firm's templates and playbook, and agreements from 19 to over 80 pagesA draft built from the source materials, and a review of what came backLive
Pensions contractual termsA trustee's terms in a table whose shape changes every time, and the insurer's playbookThe same document returned marked up, each position explained against the playbookLive
What the agents never do: decide a position. The securitisation agent tells a lawyer what to look at; it does not sign anything off. The agents ask rather than invent, and write nothing that is not already in the playbook.
04 · How it works
The work arrives the way the work already arrives.
The firm points one of its own mailboxes at each agent. A lawyer or client emails it much as they would email a colleague, and the work comes back the same way: a covering note, the document marked up, the open points listed.
The lawyerSend the workTo a firm mailbox, the way they would send it to a colleague
AgentApply the playbookThe firm's positions, clause by clause, to what arrived
AgentReturn it marked upCovering note, the document, every position explained
The lawyerKeep the judgmentDecide the open points, sign off
Nobody logs into anything. A practice group is never onboarded onto software it will not open. The two human steps are at either end, and both are decisions.
Asks, never assumes
Missing or contradictory inputs produce a question to the lawyer by email or through a pre-filled form. The agent does not proceed on a guess.
Every step auditable
Administrators see a full audit trail of every request, question and draft, so the legal function can evidence how each document was produced.
“Our lawyers really enjoy it when they interact with AI invisibly. It needs to be a tool that they do not necessarily feel like they are using.”
Ali ChaudhrySenior Legal Engineer, Simmons & Simmons
05 · The case study
Five pages, in more depth.
