Ivo

High-Level Overview

Ivo AI is a San Francisco-based legal tech company founded in 2022 that builds an AI-powered contract review platform to streamline negotiations for legal, procurement, sales, and business teams.[1][2][3] Its core product includes AI redlining tools, a smart contract repository with relationship detection and composite agreements, and an agentic AI assistant for context-aware edits, instant answers, and legal research across jurisdictions, serving enterprises like Pinterest, Quora, and Canva while reducing time, cost, and risk in contract workflows.[2][3][4] With 11-50 employees and recent Series A funding led by Costanoa Ventures, Ivo demonstrates strong growth momentum through product expansion, international scaling, and rebranding from Latch.[1]

Origin Story

Ivo was founded in 2022 in New Zealand by Jacob Duligall, a contract attorney, and Min-Kyu Jung, alongside a team of lawyers, technologists, and operators experienced in contract workflows.[1][2] The idea emerged from founders' firsthand frustrations with manual, fragmented contract processes that slow business and introduce risks, leading to the development of an initial AI-powered redlining tool.[2] Early traction included Pre-Seed funding for core platform build and product-market fit in legal tech, followed by a Seed round for rebranding from Latch, team hires, and partnerships; pivotal moments include relocation to San Francisco headquarters and Series A funding to accelerate AI enhancements and global expansion.[1]

Core Differentiators

• Context-Aware AI Redlining: Delivers precise, playbook-backed edits in Word with surgical clause detection, outperforming generic tools by understanding legal nuance and historical agreements.[2][4]
• Smart Repository: Uses proprietary clustering for automatic relationship detection (e.g., amendments into composite contracts), AI views/columns via plain English prompts for insights like risks or renewals, and grounded answers to complex queries.[3][4]
• Agentic Legal Assistant: Provides real-time collaboration, exhaustive clause-aware responses, and multi-jurisdiction research from 100+ sources (e.g., EDGAR, U.S. Code), always citing context for accuracy and compliance.[4]
• Enterprise Security and Breadth: SOC 2 Type II certified, serves diverse functions beyond legal (e.g., sales, procurement), with speed and ease via web integration—trusted by global enterprises for efficiency without sacrificing judgment.[2][4]

Role in the Broader Tech Landscape

Ivo rides the AI legal tech wave, capitalizing on generative AI's maturation to automate high-volume, nuance-heavy contract tasks amid rising deal volumes and regulatory complexity.[1][2][4] Timing is ideal post-2022 AI boom, as enterprises demand cost-cutting tools amid economic pressures, with legal spend on contracts ballooning—market forces like SaaS adoption and agentic AI favor Ivo's expansion from redlining to full platforms.[1][4] It influences the ecosystem by enabling faster business velocity for startups and enterprises, reducing legal bottlenecks, and setting standards for grounded, secure AI in productivity software, backed by investors like Costanoa Ventures.[1][2]

Quick Take & Future Outlook

Ivo is poised for rapid scaling with Series A fuel targeting product depth (e.g., advanced agents, more jurisdictions) and customer growth beyond current enterprise wins.[1] Trends like multimodal AI, vertical agents, and global compliance will amplify its edge, potentially capturing share in the $10B+ legal tech market as hybrid human-AI workflows standardize.[4] Its influence may evolve from niche redliner to indispensable contracting OS, empowering business-first contracts and accelerating Ivo's path to unicorn status—much like how it transforms slow negotiations into seamless velocity.[2]