Thomson Reuters launched CoCounsel Knowledge Search for iManage on July 9, 2025, enabling AmLaw 100 firms to access unified AI search across their document management systems and Thomson Reuters content.[1] This development signals a significant shift in how legal research workflows may evolve, while highlighting the competitive landscape emerging around iManage integrations.
Unified Search Across Internal and External Content
The new tool integrates with multiple systems including iManage, NetDocuments, Microsoft SharePoint, and OneDrive, plus Thomson Reuters Westlaw and Practical Law Global. Users can query internal documents alongside external legal resources without moving files, maintaining data security within the customer’s environment. Future updates will add agentic search in the CoCounsel chat interface and integration with Microsoft tools.
This approach addresses a longstanding challenge in legal research: the friction between accessing internal institutional knowledge and external legal databases. By creating a single search interface, Thomson Reuters is positioning CoCounsel as a comprehensive research hub rather than just another AI tool.
The Growing iManage AI Ecosystem
This launch demonstrates that iManage integrations are available to multiple AI providers, following similar announcements from Harvey on June 5, 2025, and Rio Tinto’s ChatGPT Enterprise implementation in June 2025.[2][3] Such non-exclusive access could enable firms to select from various AI tools while using existing document management systems, with additional vendors likely to announce comparable integrations if demand persists.
The pattern suggests iManage is positioning itself as a platform that supports multiple AI providers rather than favoring exclusive partnerships. This strategy could benefit law firms by preserving choice and preventing vendor lock-in while leveraging existing document management infrastructure.
Regulatory Landscape Remains Fragmented
Meanwhile, law firm procurement teams must continue monitoring state and local AI laws, as the federal moratorium on such regulations was removed before the “One Big Beautiful Bill” signing on July 4, 2025.[4]
The budget reconciliation bill originally proposed a 10-year ban on state and local restrictions for AI models and systems in interstate commerce but dropped it due to insufficient support. This outcome preserves the current patchwork of regulations, particularly affecting AI use in employment decisions like hiring.
Prompt Engineering Risks in Focus
Legal tech buyers evaluating client-facing AI chatbots should prioritize robust prompt safeguards, as xAI’s Grok generated antisemitic content on July 8, 2025, leading to post removals.[5]
The chatbot posted content praising Hitler and using antisemitic tropes, prompting complaints from users and the Anti-Defamation League. GitHub diff c5de4a1 showed xAI deleting the problematic line “The response should not shy away from making claims which are politically incorrect, as long as they are well substantiated” from their system prompts.[6] The incident generated extensive media coverage, including multiple New York Times articles.[7][8][9]
Action point: Require vendors to share their full system-prompt audit logs. This incident demonstrates how poorly-audited system prompts can cause significant reputational and operational issues for AI-powered tools.
Companies building chatbots in-house should consult those with experience in prompt engineering and moderation, as careful system prompt crafting—something UseJunior prioritizes extensively—becomes increasingly critical as AI tools gain prominence.
New Model Competition Intensifies
AmLaw 100 knowledge managers can evaluate Grok 4 for advanced reasoning tasks, as xAI released the model on July 9, 2025, with benchmarks showing superior performance over OpenAI’s GPT-4o in several areas.[10][11]
The model outperforms GPT-4o on MMLU, math competitions like AIME, and coding tasks, with reported scores including higher accuracy on STEM benchmarks and a 256K token context window.[12] Claimed to possess Ph.D.-level expertise across fields, Grok 4 could support legal research, document analysis, and technical queries if integrated into enterprise tools. Access remains through xAI’s platforms, with potential for API availability to enable custom legal applications.
Industry Insights from Harvard Law Panel
AmLaw 100 firms can implement panel-recommended AI strategies for immediate quality assurance and future knowledge management to improve draft reviews and firm differentiation.
The July 10, 2025, panel, attended by 220 Harvard Law alumni and others, featured the author as a panelist alongside Paula Brancato, Jorian Hoover, Joe Milam, James Sherman, and Will Swisher (of unicorn EliseAI), hosted by Christopher Edwards. Discussions centered on two main areas:
Immediate Implementation: Using AI to check human-drafted documents for about 10 common errors, delivering fast feedback to junior associates for better drafts without cutting billable hours but increasing client value through extra checks.
Strategic Preparation: Prioritizing structured knowledge capture, such as client playbooks and QA checklists, over the next 4-6 years to gain advantages as AI advances beyond basic data. The panel referenced METR’s “Measuring AI Ability to Complete Long Tasks” paper, which estimates AI’s five-year progress on autonomy using past trends.[13]
What This Means for Your Practice
The Thomson Reuters CoCounsel launch represents more than just another AI tool—it signals the maturation of AI-powered legal research platforms and the importance of integration with existing workflows. For firms evaluating AI solutions, the key considerations include:
- Platform flexibility: Choose solutions that integrate with existing document management systems
- Vendor diversity: Ensure your document management platform supports multiple AI providers
- Security and compliance: Prioritize solutions that maintain data within your environment
- Prompt engineering: Require transparency in system prompts and moderation practices
The convergence of multiple AI providers around iManage suggests that document management systems are becoming the foundation for AI-powered legal workflows, making integration capabilities a critical factor in technology decisions.
This development builds on broader trends we’ve analyzed in our coverage of major law firm AI partnerships, showing how traditional law firms are successfully integrating AI rather than being disrupted by it.
If you’re interested in exploring how these AI capabilities could transform your practice, contact our team to learn more about bringing sophisticated AI legal assistants to your organization.
References
[1] Thomson Reuters press release, “Thomson Reuters Launches CoCounsel Knowledge Search,” July 9, 2025. https://www.thomsonreuters.com/en/press-releases/2025/july/thomson-reuters-launches-cocounsel-knowledge-search-an-ai-powered-experience-to-manage-content-and-institutional-knowledge
[2] iManage blog, “Harvey Announces Technology Partnership with iManage,” June 5, 2025. https://imanage.com/resources/resource-center/blog/harvey-announces-technology-partnership-with-imanage/
[3] LinkedIn post by Christopher de Waas, Rio Tinto Digital Transformation Lead, June 2025. https://www.linkedin.com/posts/cdewaas_chatgpt-legaltech-knowledgemanagement-activity-7338182908152557568-L_BR
[4] One Big Beautiful Bill Act, Pub. L. No. 119–21, 139 Stat. ___ (2025). https://www.lawandtheworkplace.com/2025/07/big-beautiful-bill-leaves-ai-regulation-to-states-and-localities-for-now/
[5] Reuters, “Musk chatbot Grok removes posts after complaints of antisemitism,” July 9, 2025. https://www.reuters.com/technology/musk-chatbot-grok-removes-posts-after-complaints-antisemitism-2025-07-09/
[6] GitHub commit showing xAI prompt changes. https://github.com/xai-org/grok-prompts/commit/c5de4a14feb50b0e5b3e8554f9c8aae8c97b56b4
[7] New York Times, “Grok, Elon Musk’s A.I. Chatbot, Is Generating Antisemitic Content,” July 8, 2025. https://www.nytimes.com/2025/07/08/technology/grok-antisemitism-ai-x.html
[8] New York Times Opinion, “The Grok Incident Shows Why A.I. Needs Better Guardrails,” July 11, 2025. https://www.nytimes.com/2025/07/11/opinion/ai-grok-x-llm.html
[9] New York Times, “Late-Night Hosts Mock Grok’s Antisemitic Posts,” July 10, 2025. https://www.nytimes.com/2025/07/10/arts/television/late-night-grok-antisemitic-posts.html
[10] Scientific American, “Elon Musk’s New Grok 4 Takes on Humanity’s Last Exam as the AI Race Heats Up,” July 9, 2025. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/elon-musks-new-grok-4-takes-on-humanitys-last-exam-as-the-ai-race-heats-up/
[11] Medium, “The Emergence of Grok 4: A Deep Dive into xAI’s Flagship AI Model,” July 2025. https://medium.com/predict/the-emergence-of-grok-4-a-deep-dive-into-xais-flagship-ai-model-eda5d500e4e7
[12] DataCamp, “Grok 4: Everything You Need to Know,” July 2025. https://www.datacamp.com/blog/grok-4
[13] METR, “Measuring AI Ability to Complete Long Tasks,” arXiv preprint arXiv:2503.14499, 2025. https://arxiv.org/abs/2503.14499