Priori Digest #249 | Climate Change Litigation Milestone, Law Firm Leasing Rises & Instacart’s IPO

With summer finally winding down we are heading full steam ahead into September at Priori. We have a number of exciting events coming up soon, including:

• September 13 – My Co-Founder and Priori Chief Product Officer Mirra Levitt is honored to be on this year’s ABA Women of Legal Tech list and will be speaking at their summit.
• September 14 – I’m hosting a webinar with Janine Dixon, Meta’s Legal Operations Manager, and Lynden Renwick, Managing Partner of Out-House Attorneys, about the rate review process they built together. Join us for “The Price Is Right: How Meta Manages Its Rate Review Process.”
• September 20–22 – The Priori team is looking forward to connecting with the legal ops community at Legal Operators’ Summit by the Sea in Santa Barbara, CA.
• September 27 – I’ll share some market insights from the activity on our platform in a Priori Marketplace Demo with Priori VP of Client Development Matt Wheatley.

In this 249th edition of the Priori Digest, we look at a climate change lawsuit with potentially large implications, law firm office leasing trends and Instacart’s upcoming IPO.

Warmly,

Basha Rubin | CEO & Co-Founder

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View upcoming Priori events

Legal News

• ??? A recent ruling in Montana’s First Judicial District Court that will likely affect how state agencies consider climate change when making decisions is “a paradigm shift in climate litigation,” according to NPR.
• ?? Just two months after a similar flub by Sony, redaction errors returned to the news this week when a reporter found that fare increase estimates that were blacked out in a JetBlue court filing were visible when copied and pasted into a new document.
• ?? The return-to-office trend in the legal sector isn’t going anywhere: In the first half of 2023, law firms leased 3.3 million square feet of space—up 22.3% over the same period in 2022.

Legal Trivia

Answers at the end:?

1. When did Labor Day first become an official federal holiday in the United States?

2. Which U.S. political party held the first national convention to pick their candidate for President?

3. When was the United States Constitution last amended?

Tech News

• ?? Although NFT issuer Impact Theory marketed itself as the next Disney, its offices probably aren’t the happiest place on earth this week after the SEC announced it charged the company in the agency’s first-ever action against NFTs as unregistered securities.
• ? Researchers at an Australian university are giving new meaning to the concept of strong coffee—they developed a method for turning used coffee grounds into a substance called biochar that can replace sand in concrete.
• ?? Grocery delivery company Instacart filed for its IPO last week, making it the first notable venture-backed tech company to go public since December 2021.

Legal Quote of the Week

“The business of the law is to make sense of the confusion of what we call human life–to reduce it to order but at the same time to give it possibility, scope, even dignity.”

– Lawyer and poet Archibald MacLeish in an address delivered at the 85th Anniversary Banquet of the Harvard Law Review (1972)?

Latest From LinkedIn

Priori Senior Account Manager Erin Dunn talks about starting a new role.

By the Numbers

$12,000

The amount Tesla investors will receive (per person) as a result of an SEC action regarding Elon Musk’s 2018 tweet that declared he had “funding secured” to take the company private.

$9.6 billion

The price private equity firm Roark Capital paid to acquire Subway, “ending the sandwich chain’s more than five decades of family ownership,” according to CNBC.

More From Priori?

?? In case you missed it, here are some recent highlights from the Priori blog:?

• We take a look at legal operations and in-house counsel events happening this fall.
• Learn how legal departments can drive cost savings with rate reviews.
• We made the list! We’re proud to be a part of the 2023 Inc. 5000 fastest-growing private companies in the U.S.

Legal Trivia Answers

1. 1894.
2. The Federalist Party held secret national meetings in 1808 to pick their candidates.
3. 1992 (the 27th Amendment).

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