We’re honored to announce Dr. Megan Ma as an advisor to Billables AI, bringing her unparalleled expertise at the intersection of technology and law to our mission of transforming the way lawyers work.
Dr. Ma is the Associate Director of the CodeX and Law, Science and Technology Program at Stanford Law School. She is a globally recognized thought leader in the legal tech space, often cited for her influential speaking engagements at top legal tech events like the Legal Innovators Conference, ILTACon, and more. Her work focuses on bridging the gap between innovative technologies and the legal profession—a perfect match for Billables AI's mission to empower lawyers with tools that supercharge their practice.
In her own words, “Time and billing are the OS of the law firm. Being able to leverage generative AI directly into lawyers' billing will provide deeper insights into the nuance and value offered behind the practice.”
A Trailblazer in Legal Tech
Dr. Ma’s journey into the legal tech space began with research in consumer-facing medical AI and its implications for medical malpractice and product liability. Later, her work with self-driving car technologies inspired a broader exploration of how tech built for the legal space would impact engagement with legal infrastructure.
Today, she continues to lead groundbreaking research while teaching computational law at Stanford. She also serves as Editor-in-Chief for the Cambridge Forum on AI, Law, and Governance, is the Managing Editor of the MIT Computational Law Report and a Research Affiliate at Singapore Management University in their Centre for Computational Law.
Her most recent work includes developing agent-based simulations and leveraging generative AI for the continuous training and development of legal professionals. This work aims to use technology to aid in the transfer of knowledge between seasoned professionals and budding lawyers.
Top-of-Mind Insights
We asked Dr. Ma to share a few of her top-of-mind insights with us. Check out her responses below.
What are 3 key trends in legal tech that excite you?
The future of UI/UX considers how integration of generative AI enables a forthcoming collaboration between humans and machines – going beyond MS Word plug-ins, "co-pilots", and disconnected chatbot assistance.
Evolutionary model-merging builds on further customization and personalization of workflow automation based on combining small models to develop bespoke legal tools.
Multi-agent simulation (e.g. Agent Hospital) will allow us to better understand and evaluate the quality of legal work through behavioral observations.
What’s a legal tech myth that should be debunked?
Legal Tech Myth: “Optimizing for accuracy in performance is what convinces lawyers to use the technology.”
As lawyers are largely risk averse, they often make the argument that "unless the technology is perfect, we won't be able to trust it." This often triggers a risk mitigation response by ensuring that machine performance must be infallible and 100% accurate. Evidently, this is a double standard between humans and machines.
Yet framed differently, what lawyers really care for is a tangible understanding of how this technology directly adds value to their workflow. Lawyers want to remain the decision-makers. If the technology demonstrably showcases human judgment as primordial, trust for adoption would become inevitable.
What advice do you have for young lawyers beginning their career?
If you value interdisciplinary learning, legal tech is the perfect space. Building technology in the legal space is more about learning the psychology, cognitive/thought processes, and social practices of lawyers than the engineering itself.
Please join us in welcoming Dr. Megan Ma to the Billables AI family! We’re excited for what’s ahead as we continue to innovate and help lawyers everywhere leverage technology to do their best work.
