Legal AI startup Superpanel has raised $5.3 million in seed funding to speed up the growth of its platform that automates the legal intake process for plaintiff law firms. Co-founded by Julien Emery and Dingyu Zhang, the round was co-led by Outlander VC and Field Ventures, with participation from LOI Venture, Zenda Capital, 8-Bit Capital, and Behind Genius Ventures.
Legal intake, the process where law firms evaluate potential new clients and their claims, is known to be complex and time-consuming. It often involves gathering detailed stories from clients, collecting supporting documents, verifying jurisdiction, and managing compliance.
Traditional intake processes can be slow and prone to mistakes, creating roadblocks that wear down both clients and firms. For many people seeking help, it feels like navigating a maze filled with endless forms, dropped calls, and confusing hoops, leading many to give up before ever getting assistance.
Julien Emery, Superpanel’s CEO and co-founder, speaks from personal experience. Having witnessed the challenges his own family faced in accessing legal support after a car accident, Emery understands the emotional and financial toll of slow, outdated legal processes.
“For consumers, it’s a maze that leads many to give up before getting help,” he said. “For firms, it’s a costly, error-prone bottleneck.” Superpanel’s mission is to remove that bottleneck by leveraging AI to handle routine and repetitive intake tasks efficiently and accurately.
Streamlining Legal Intake
Superpanel’s AI platform works like a “digital teammate,” automating approximately half of the legal intake process, engaging with prospective clients across multiple channels including phone, text, email, and forums. The AI guides litigants through their story, gathering relevant details and necessary evidence such as police reports or medical records.
Using advanced natural language processing and rules-based logic, the system categorizes case types, infers jurisdiction, and identifies missing or ambiguous information that requires human review.
When the AI detects uncertainty or potential risk, it escalates the case to a human team member with a concise summary rather than raw data. By automating the repetitive and time-consuming parts, Superpanel frees up legal teams to focus on the challenging parts of their work.
Investors see strong potential in Superpanel’s approach to removing a persistent pain point in the legal industry, making legal services more accessible and efficient.
Jordan Kretchmer, senior partner at Outlander VC, noted, “AI is redefining what software can be. Intake is one of the biggest unsolved bottlenecks in law, and Superpanel has built a system that not only scales but restores trust and consistency at a moment when the market needs it most.”
Catering Solutions for High-Volume Firms
Legal tech automation is a growing market with several players offering intake and client management solutions. While many legal tech companies provide intake tools, few match Superpanel’s deep specialization and comprehensive coverage.
Competitors like Clio Grow, LegalClerk.ai, MyCase, and Whippy.ai offer strong solutions but often cater to broader or different segments of the market or cover isolated parts of the intake workflow. Unlike these platforms, Superpanel offers an end-to-end intake experience tailored specifically for plaintiff firms, particularly those dealing with personal injury, employment, mass torts, and class action cases where intake efficiency is paramount.
Its AI engagement is continuous, capable of following up autonomously with clients who may not have a case immediately but could later develop one, ensuring no opportunity is lost. It is also built with security and compliance in mind and connects smoothly with the case management software legal firms already use.
