TyMetrix Selected as Microsoft Awards Finalist for Collaborative Matter Management for Law Departments

Hartford, CT. — September 21, 2001 — TyMetrix, Inc., a pioneer in developing electronic invoicing and financial management technologies and a leader in providing Internet application services to the legal community, announced today that it has been selected by Microsoft as a finalist in its Microsoft Exchange and Collaboration Solutions (MEC) Awards 2001 program in the category of “Best Vertical-focused Solution” for its CynOps Collaborative Matter Management System. This category is awarded to a solution, product, or service targeted at a specific vertical market that positively impacts strategic business processes and extends the value MS Exchange 2000 technologies to solve real business problems specific to that market. The category award winner will be announced by Microsoft at its MEC Convention in Orlando, FL, on October 1st.

CynOps is a unique merger of collaborative networks and matter management features. It is primarily a service for the creation and organization of collaborative networks, where each network is created to support a specific corporate client and its activities with all of its outside law firms. Each network is deployed with an integrated work-flow-driven matter management system and an integrated financial management system. The CynOps development team leveraged Microsoft Windows 2000, Microsoft Exchange 2000, and Microsoft Visual Studio (to name just a few) to build a state-of-the-art “digital nervous system” integrated with TyMetrix, the leading provider of electronic invoice processing services.

Following the announcement, Mike Curreri, TyMetrix’ Senior Vice President responsible for the CynOps offering, said, “The basic problem addressed by all large corporate consumers of law firm services is that these services have been inefficiently delivered, difficult to organize into a cooperative team effort, and difficult to monitor and manage. The CynOps Collaborative Matter Management System answers these needs superbly for both substantive matter and financial information. It is fitting that Microsoft would recognize us as the only finalist supporting the legal community.”

“The integration of the legal industry’s mission-critical applications of matter management, document management, electronic invoicing, contact management, calendar management and vendor management can now be delivered,” he went on to say, “via a highly personalized next-generation web portal interface. This maximizes the collaborative potential of both the Internet and the underlying Microsoft applications. Through CynOps, TyMetrix provides the most advanced, fully featured, and user-friendly collaboration and matter management tool available to lawyers and their clients today.”

“Microsoft is pleased to honor TyMetrix as an MEC Awards 2001 finalist for Best Vertical-focused Solution,” said Kevin McCuistion, Microsoft’s Exchange group product manager. “When combining Exchange 2000 and products like CynOps, customers can automate their business processes and empower their employees to improve productivity. We’re excited to see how partners and developers have embraced Exchange 2000 and its native XML and WebDAV support to build products and solutions that deliver real business value to our customers.”

The application of these technologies allows for a uniquely customizable client application where user administrators create customized data elements on virtually all objects inherent in the system. The resulting collaborative networks process each matter following workflow patterns already familiar to lawyers and their support staff, making the system appear extremely user-friendly and “second nature” in use and design.

Realizing that system design and collaborative culture issues present significant challenges for any company serving the legal industry, TyMetrix is staffed with some of the nation’s most experienced personnel in this area. “There is no company in the nation that has more experience in collaborative networking, law related financial management and performance metrics for the legal community,” said Curreri. “And because the learning curve on these matters is steep and long, TyMetrix generates huge savings for clients in implementation costs.”

International Paper’s law department has recently gone fully operational with the completion of training and final implementation of CynOps to leverage the use of TyMetrix’ electronic invoicing and financial management system, which it first brought online in the spring of this year. Jennifer Pearce, Legal Resource Coordinator for IP, is enthusiastic about the results.

“The CynOps system is a workflow and process model that does more than just track information,” she declared. “It streamlines the process of setting up files, establishing deadlines, keeping projects on track and creating an internal knowledge bank. It automatically requests information when it’s needed, and sends out electronic reminders if the process is delayed. It also gives us practice tools and other aggregated information we wouldn’t have, if we were not getting both financial information management and matter management from a single source.”

“The result,” according to Curreri, “is a system that optimizes data input and reuse, assists managers and retained counsel in better managing their legal matters, and significantly enhances the quality of communications between participants. It enhances the quality of representation by allowing all participants to share in the developing knowledge base and optimizes the team’s ability to discern patterns and develop effective representation strategies which can be selectively deployed.”

“This complete package of collaborative and management tools is then tightly integrated with the financial management tools of TyMetrix -- electronic presentment of invoices, processing and paying those invoices, and tracking and managing the legal expenses through the industry’s fullest-featured system of reporting tools and metrics. Integrating these financial and substantive information systems creates a decision making tool that is second to none in the legal services industry,” he went on to say.

Although the CynOps system can be used without the TyMetrix e-invoicing system, Pearce is quick to note, “The fact that these systems are fully integrated means that financial case-related data already available to the user becomes an additional tool for managing litigation. Now we can execute matter-specific case assessments, budgets, and plans along with our own matter-specific workflow and a fully integrated, collaborative system for managing documents, contacts, calendars, and forums for discussion.”

After 6 months in production, CynOps is managing information for 3 corporate law departments, 226 law firms, and 1,414 lawyers and paralegals. To date, 13,659 matters have been created with over 170,000 Exchange folders, containing 14 GB of legal documents, metadata, and collaborative content. Cynops data is growing at a rate of approximately 2 GB/month. Because of CynOps’ indispensable nature as a tool for the management of each lawyer’s personal workload, and its practical integration with billing information for each matter immediately upon its electronic presentment, it is expected that these utilization numbers will continue to rise exponentially.

TyMetrix, Inc., empowers Corporate Law and Claim Departments to reach new levels of partnership and performance with outside counsel by delivering law firm performance metrics and financial data analysis for decision-makers nationwide. As the pioneer in developing legal e-billing technologies over the Internet, TyMetrix continues to break new ground in its services to the legal community through robust reporting tools, analytics, and custom systems design with unrivaled, consultative service and world-class support. Its clients include several of the largest insurance companies and major corporate law departments throughout the country with participating law firms everywhere.

TyMetrix can be reached at (860) 549-8795; or, visit our web site at www.TyMetrix.com.

For additional comment, contact swallace@TyMetrix.com