August Targets the Legal Middle with Configurable AI

When Joseph Parker talks about midsize law firms, he often thinks of the ones he grew up around in Richmond, Virginia: places where lawyers run into clients at football games or the grocery store. “These firms know their community and what they represent in it,” he wrote in a post announcing his company’s launch. “They deserve best-in-class AI tools.” Parker, along with Rutvik Rau and Thomas Bueler-Faudree, co-founded August in 2024 to bring configurable AI software to midsize legal practices. The team met at Columbia University’s machine learning research lab and later worked across law, finance, and tech, including stints at Blackstone, DoorDash, and PayPal. That interdisciplinary background shaped August’s approach: build legal AI that adapts to each firm’s existing w