Your Firm Already Has an AI Strategy. It’s Called Your Document Management System.

Patrick Ng, founder of InPlace Solutions, a boutique legal technology advisory to Australia’s top 50 firms, and a former Big Law CIO, explains why the biggest AI decision most firms will make this year isn’t about buying a new tool. It’s about what they do with the platform they already trust.

About Patrick Ng

Patrick Ng leads InPlace Solutions, a boutique consultancy working exclusively with Australia’s top 50 law firms, a deliberately narrow market he and his partners chose after building their careers as CIOs inside big law. That vantage point, sitting on both sides of the buyer-vendor relationship, shapes how he advises firms on AI adoption today. 

The Problem: AI Feels Like One More Vendor to Manage 

For most firms, AI has arrived as a wave of point solutions: another login, another integration, another thing IT must secure and support. Ng’s clients don’t want to simplify their AI challenge by adding more to the stack. They want to know if it can be made simple, and if it can be governed. 

Why the Platform, Not a New Tool, Is the Answer 

Ng’s view is that the document management system (DMS) is where this gets resolved, because it’s already the environment firms produce from. AI doesn’t need to be bolted on top; it needs to be built into the platform the firm has already invested in and trusts. He points to how PDF production moved from a standalone software purchase into a native platform capability as the model for where AI in the DMS is heading: useful, intuitive, and built on an environment that’s already there. 

Two Buyers, Two Different Calculations 

CIOs and managing partners are both part of this decision, but they weigh different things: 

• CIOs focus on consolidation: fewer vendors, less complexity, and a platform they can keep building on rather than replacing piece by piece. Security is non-negotiable. 
• Managing partners focus on stakeholders: client stickiness, and proof that the firm’s technology investment shows up as a differentiator clients actually notice, whether that’s throughput, quality, or the capacity to take on more work. 

The New Trust Test: Can You Get Out If You Need To? 

Migration used to be the thing firms dreaded about switching platforms. Ng notes that’s changed. Open file formats and cloud-native systems mean moving between platforms is no longer the ordeal it once was. That shift has changed the sales conversation: firms have the comfort of a competitive market, so the vendor relationship has to keep earning its place rather than relying on switching costs to keep clients in. 

“Which is the best platform at the end of the day” is, in Ng’s view, the real question underneath every DMS decision, along with whether the vendor will still be backing the firm on that platform years from now. 

Key Takeaways 

• AI’s value is tied to the environment it’s built into, not the tool itself 
• CIOs and managing partners evaluate AI readiness through different lenses: platform consolidation versus client-facing differentiation 
• Open formats and cloud-native architecture have lowered the cost of switching, raising the bar on vendor trust 

The long-term question isn’t which platform has the most features today. It’s which vendor will keep investing alongside your firm