The 12th annual Relativity Fest kicked off this week in Chicago before over 1,800 attendees. Lots of announcements, the most significant of which was that starting in early 2026, the Relativity aiR for Review and aiR for Privilege products will be included in the standard Relativity One package and pricing. The accompanying press release announcing the change describes these tools as “generative AI solutions for legal review.”
In other words, what were previously only obtainable by paying a separate and additional charge will now essentially be free for Relativity customers.
Why Is This Important?
This is important because so many vendors try to create AI programs and then charge separately for them to generate revenue. Many of these products are already expensive and adding an AI surcharge can place them out of reach for many practitioners. And the idea that there are separate charges for the state-of-the-art products feels like nickel and diming that does little more than breed mistrust.
Yet these products can save thousands of dollars and countless hours and are valuable. Many AI tools do little more than make the rich richer, providing an advantage to the large firms that can afford state-of-the-art tools. Offering the review and privilege review tools as part of the standard package levels the playing field. It also makes for better results when both sides have access to the same tools.
Phil Saunders, the Relativity CEO, put it this way: “We believe generative AI is the undeniable future of review, and we’re making it easy for all RelativityOne customers to experience the platform.”
In some respects, the decision reflects the culture of the company and in particular the philosophy of Saunders who has been in that position for almost three years. Unlike many of those in C-suites of legal tech companies, Saunders is refreshingly honest. He’s self-deprecating. He’s humble but confident. He’s the kind of CEO who goes to the somewhat drab hotel gym to work out with everyone else instead of being chauffeured to someplace fancy with his entourage. You know the kind of guy you want to have a beer with? That’s Saunders.
Some Honesty For a Change
Consistent with his style and philosophy, Saunders made a number of revealing and candid comments in the Keynote and afterwards in a press conference.
For example, one of the tools announced recently by Relativity is aiR Strategy, which helps users create case strategies. When asked why that tool was also not being bundled in the standard package, his response was interesting: frankly, he admitted that the product is not quite ready yet. It’s not a “real-time, best-in-class” offering. Interesting and honest: bundling aiR Strategy will apparently be discussed only when the product is ready.
When asked about future mergers and acquisitions, Saunders also answered honestly that the company had not been good at integrating acquired companies in the past. He also noted that a lack of a culture fit just fuels disruption. So, says Saunders, Relativity just hasn’t been ready for more acquisitions.
Saunders also raised the question of the importance of (or perhaps lack of importance) of focusing too much on revenue: “just because something builds revenue doesn’t mean it’s going to serve the customers well… we have to get over the reality that revenue is like heroin, it’s addictive.”
Saunders also addressed the relationship of Relativity with its partners. He firmly planted a flag: Relativity partners can’t take a Relativity product and mark it up. “It’s not serving the end customer by marking up a platform 5X to maintain the margins they once had in the human review business and then doing a bunch of consulting services and charging $800 an hour.”
Relationships with partners can often be touchy: it’s like the relationship between franchisors and franchisees that I’m familiar with from practicing law. They need each other but if the franchisor doesn’t make sure the franchisee offers the products fairly and honestly, everyone gets hurt. It’s the same here, so it’s good to see Saunders make Relativity’s stance clear.
Saunders was also asked if the recently announced Relativity Rel Labs program, an investment program that would support legal tech startups, might partner with or invest in some socially oriented AI tools. Another honest answer: “that’s a really good question, we haven’t thought of it.”
As Saunders put it, “if we don’t know something, we own it.”
Company Culture
Concluding the press conference, Saunders summed up in a few words what he thinks the culture of Relativity is or should be. First, it approaches things with “radical candor” where ideas and for that matter, failures, are discussed openly and robustly. It strives to be “humble but hungry.”
Platitudes? Maybe. But if bundling key tools without charging extra for them is any indication, this culture may be real.
Plus, by the way, says Saunders, radical candor lets him swear a lot.
Why This Approach Works
I don’t work for Relativity. I’m not there day to day. I don’t use their products. But in an era when many tech vendors overpromise underperforming products or announce products that will be offered later, offer enhancements that don’t do much new, or offer products as add-ons to their central core products, Saunders’s honesty and transparency is refreshing.
As with most customer relationships, at the end of the day, it needs to be about trust. Honesty and transparency generate trust. Doing the right thing like including key programs in the standard platform says a lot. Particularly in a business where relationships between legal service providers and their clients hinge almost entirely on trust.
If only other vendors followed suit, they might be become trusted allies instead of just vendors.
Stephen Embry is a lawyer, speaker, blogger, and writer. He publishes TechLaw Crossroads, a blog devoted to the examination of the tension between technology, the law, and the practice of law.
The post Relativity Offers Key AI Products At No Extra Charge — But That’s Not The Most Important Thing appeared first on Above the Law.
The 12th annual Relativity Fest kicked off this week in Chicago before over 1,800 attendees. Lots of announcements, the most significant of which was that starting in early 2026, the Relativity aiR for Review and aiR for Privilege products will be included in the standard Relativity One package and pricing. The accompanying press release announcing the change describes these tools as “generative AI solutions for legal review.”
In other words, what were previously only obtainable by paying a separate and additional charge will now essentially be free for Relativity customers.
Why Is This Important?
This is important because so many vendors try to create AI programs and then charge separately for them to generate revenue. Many of these products are already expensive and adding an AI surcharge can place them out of reach for many practitioners. And the idea that there are separate charges for the state-of-the-art products feels like nickel and diming that does little more than breed mistrust.
Yet these products can save thousands of dollars and countless hours and are valuable. Many AI tools do little more than make the rich richer, providing an advantage to the large firms that can afford state-of-the-art tools. Offering the review and privilege review tools as part of the standard package levels the playing field. It also makes for better results when both sides have access to the same tools.
Phil Saunders, the Relativity CEO, put it this way: “We believe generative AI is the undeniable future of review, and we’re making it easy for all RelativityOne customers to experience the platform.”
In some respects, the decision reflects the culture of the company and in particular the philosophy of Saunders who has been in that position for almost three years. Unlike many of those in C-suites of legal tech companies, Saunders is refreshingly honest. He’s self-deprecating. He’s humble but confident. He’s the kind of CEO who goes to the somewhat drab hotel gym to work out with everyone else instead of being chauffeured to someplace fancy with his entourage. You know the kind of guy you want to have a beer with? That’s Saunders.
Some Honesty For a Change
Consistent with his style and philosophy, Saunders made a number of revealing and candid comments in the Keynote and afterwards in a press conference.
For example, one of the tools announced recently by Relativity is aiR Strategy, which helps users create case strategies. When asked why that tool was also not being bundled in the standard package, his response was interesting: frankly, he admitted that the product is not quite ready yet. It’s not a “real-time, best-in-class” offering. Interesting and honest: bundling aiR Strategy will apparently be discussed only when the product is ready.
When asked about future mergers and acquisitions, Saunders also answered honestly that the company had not been good at integrating acquired companies in the past. He also noted that a lack of a culture fit just fuels disruption. So, says Saunders, Relativity just hasn’t been ready for more acquisitions.
Saunders also raised the question of the importance of (or perhaps lack of importance) of focusing too much on revenue: “just because something builds revenue doesn’t mean it’s going to serve the customers well… we have to get over the reality that revenue is like heroin, it’s addictive.”
Saunders also addressed the relationship of Relativity with its partners. He firmly planted a flag: Relativity partners can’t take a Relativity product and mark it up. “It’s not serving the end customer by marking up a platform 5X to maintain the margins they once had in the human review business and then doing a bunch of consulting services and charging $800 an hour.”
Relationships with partners can often be touchy: it’s like the relationship between franchisors and franchisees that I’m familiar with from practicing law. They need each other but if the franchisor doesn’t make sure the franchisee offers the products fairly and honestly, everyone gets hurt. It’s the same here, so it’s good to see Saunders make Relativity’s stance clear.
Saunders was also asked if the recently announced Relativity Rel Labs program, an investment program that would support legal tech startups, might partner with or invest in some socially oriented AI tools. Another honest answer: “that’s a really good question, we haven’t thought of it.”
As Saunders put it, “if we don’t know something, we own it.”
Company Culture
Concluding the press conference, Saunders summed up in a few words what he thinks the culture of Relativity is or should be. First, it approaches things with “radical candor” where ideas and for that matter, failures, are discussed openly and robustly. It strives to be “humble but hungry.”
Platitudes? Maybe. But if bundling key tools without charging extra for them is any indication, this culture may be real.
Plus, by the way, says Saunders, radical candor lets him swear a lot.
Why This Approach Works
I don’t work for Relativity. I’m not there day to day. I don’t use their products. But in an era when many tech vendors overpromise underperforming products or announce products that will be offered later, offer enhancements that don’t do much new, or offer products as add-ons to their central core products, Saunders’s honesty and transparency is refreshing.
As with most customer relationships, at the end of the day, it needs to be about trust. Honesty and transparency generate trust. Doing the right thing like including key programs in the standard platform says a lot. Particularly in a business where relationships between legal service providers and their clients hinge almost entirely on trust.
If only other vendors followed suit, they might be become trusted allies instead of just vendors.
Stephen Embry is a lawyer, speaker, blogger, and writer. He publishes TechLaw Crossroads, a blog devoted to the examination of the tension between technology, the law, and the practice of law.
