Bloomberg Law - Bloomberg Law

Bloomberg Law is a subscription-based service for online legal research. The service, which Bloomberg L.P. introduced in 2009, provides legal content, proprietary company information and news information to attorneys, law students, and other legal professionals. More specifically, this commercial legal and business technology platform integrates Bloomberg L.P. news with Bloomberg BNA's primary and secondary legal content and business development tools.

Creation and services

Bloomberg Law's web-based platform was first released under a pilot program in late 2009. According to the Financial Times, "the unit forms part of the data provider's drive to diversify beyond the banks and investment groups that make up the core customers for its eponymous terminals." In 2010, the service was formally launched.

Prior to the creation of Bloomberg Law, two services, LexisNexis and Westlaw, comprised the majority of the legal research market. Bloomberg L.P. sought to separate itself from the competition by offering an integration of the Bloomberg company and financial data with legal research. Bloomberg Law combines content from Bloomberg’s global news network, legal analysis, court dockets, legal filings and reports from Bloomberg legal analysts as well as business news and information. Attorneys can also draw upon stock charts, search patent histories and find information about relevant judges and attorneys. The service is priced to include all features under a fixed monthly fee.

In 2011, Bloomberg L.P. purchased Bureau of National Affairs (BNA), and it integrated legal materials from BNA into Bloomberg Law.

According to Bloomberg BNA, the platform was developed to help law firms grow their top line revenue, provide counsel by getting answers quickly and efficiently, and maintain and increase their profitability. Features include Litigation and Dockets, Legal and Financial Analytics, Business Development Center, Practice Tools and News and Law Reports.

Growth and expansion

In October 2010, Lou Andreozzi, a former chief executive officer of LexisNexis North American Legal Markets, joined Bloomberg Law as chairman and Larry Thompson, a former global marketing officer of LexisNexis, joined as chief operating officer. In September 2011, Bloomberg acquired legal publisher Bureau of National Affairs (BNA) to bolster its proprietary data and content. Shortly before its acquisition of BNA, Bloomberg Law announced it would become the exclusive sponsor of SCOTUSblog, a site providing public access to U.S.Supreme Court coverage.

In September 2012, Greg McCaffery was named chief executive officer of Bloomberg Law. McCaffery had previously served as chief executive officer and president of Bloomberg BNA. In January 2014, Bloomberg BNA, a Bloomberg L.P. subsidiary, took over day-to-day operations of Bloomberg Law. In July 2014, David Perla assumed the role of president of Bloomberg BNA's Legal Division and President of Bloomberg Law. In November 2016, Scott Mozarsky assumed the role of President of Bloomberg BNA’s Legal Division.

Between 2014 and 2015, Bloomberg Law expanded and debuted features including dockets covering state, federal, and select international court cases, financial and legal analytics, and practice-specific products for corporate transactions, privacy and data security, and banking.

Features

• Dockets: Bloomberg Law Dockets cover state, federal, and select international court cases. Users also have access to Breaking Complaints, unlimited alerts and searches.
• Analytics: There are two major sets of analytics available on Bloomberg Law: financial and legal. Bloomberg Law News Search houses over 50,000 news wires, while the Business Development Center pulls together business news searches to provide insights into M&A rumors, bankruptcy rumors, recent attorney moves, and other criteria.
• Practice-specific products:
  • Bloomberg Law: Corporate Transactions, released in 2015, brings proprietary big data to the deal drafting process.
  • Bloomberg Law: Privacy & Data Security, released in 2015, combines proprietary data, laws, regulations, and secondary sources for state, federal, and international privacy laws.
  • Bloomberg Law: Banking, introduced in 2014, provides real-time banking news and analysis, primary legal content such as laws, regulations, and cases, and tools.