"It's a tool made for what I do." This is how Mitesh Patel, an intellectual property lawyer at Hopkins & Carley, describes Alt Legal, a legal technology that helps law firms and companies of all sizes automate trademark docketing. The company was founded in 2013 by Nehal Madhani, formerly an attorney at Kirkland & Ellis LLP.

To listen to Patel speak about the process of onboarding and using Alt Legal is to hear a lawyer whose practice has truly been transformed by the adoption of modern technology. Patel helped drive the firm's transition from an older IP docketing system to Alt Legal.

With a tool like Alt Legal, the key to adoption is in the pre-sales process. IP docketing (and IP offices) evolved from manual processes to the digital world years ago. Like timekeeping systems, once a firm licenses the software, individual user adoption will follow. Trademark teams must use software to keep track of the vast amount of data and deadlines to maintain their practice. As Madhani explained, this is about the lawyers' livelihood, they need to access the docket information daily. "Nine out of ten times," the adoption challenge for Alt Legal is convincing these firms that the pain of transitioning to a new system is less than the pain they're currently experiencing with their legacy system.