In the rapidly evolving world of legal operations, technology plays an increasingly critical role in shaping how in-house legal teams deliver efficiency and value. Law Squared, a legal services firm operating across Australia, the UK, and New Zealand, has recently unveiled Cubed—a legal technology platform purpose-built for in-house legal teams and designed to operate natively inside Microsoft 365. This launch signals a noteworthy development in the intersection of legal operations, cloud computing, and corporate IT governance. Below, we explore the promise of Cubed, scrutinize Law Squared’s claims, and assess both the potential impact and inherent risks of this new offering.
Cubed enters a competitive legal tech landscape dominated by contract lifecycle management (CLM) solutions and enterprise legal management platforms. Law Squared positions Cubed’s native integration with Microsoft 365 as its standout feature. Rather than introducing a separate, standalone system, Cubed centralizes matter management, workflow automation, contract intake, and approval processes directly within an organization's familiar Microsoft environment.
This tight integration taps into widely adopted corporate tools—namely Outlook, SharePoint, Power BI, and Microsoft Copilot. According to Law Squared, Cubed’s “out of the box” deployment can be completed within a single day, thereby bypassing the often lengthy and complex onboarding cycles typical of rival CLM systems. Unlike many competitors that require significant IT involvement, data migrations, and ongoing system maintenance, Cubed promises a frictionless transition for organizations already entrenched in Microsoft’s ecosystem.
A review of Microsoft’s official documentation confirms that custom applications leveraging the Microsoft Graph API can seamlessly integrate into Outlook, SharePoint, and Teams with appropriate organizational permissions. Since Cubed claims not to store any client data externally and operates entirely within the organization’s existing Microsoft tenant, its accelerated deployment timeline appears feasible—provided the client’s IT policies do not impose additional review processes and that no substantial customizations are required. Nonetheless, organizations with more complex governance, risk, or compliance requirements may still face extended internal approval phases.
However, some legal professionals caution that “consolidation” may come at the expense of deep functionality. Specialized CLM platforms often include advanced AI-driven contract analytics, negotiation workflows, clause libraries, and regulatory tracking features not typically available from simpler toolkits. Cubed’s focus on rapid deployment and ease-of-use makes it a strong fit for teams seeking an immediate reduction in administrative friction, but may not be ideal for enterprises with unusually complex regulatory or contract review requirements.
Microsoft 365 offers enterprise-grade security features, including tenant isolation, multi-factor authentication, encryption-at-rest, and comprehensive logging (as documented in the Microsoft Service Trust Portal). Provided Cubed does not introduce new APIs that transmit information outside this boundary, Law Squared’s security claims are well aligned with best practices for corporate data governance.
However, security experts emphasize that integrations with external systems (e.g., DocuSign, HubSpot, Salesforce) are only as secure as their configurations. Fixed-cost add-ons must be reviewed for compliance with both internal and external regulatory requirements. Additionally, organizations must remain vigilant about privilege access management; even tightly scoped applications can become entry points if not regularly monitored and updated in step with Microsoft’s evolving security model.
For context, Gartner’s 2023 Market Guide for CLM notes that per-user pricing remains the dominant model among cloud CLM vendors, with annual costs ranging from $600 to $2,400 per user, depending on required features and contract volumes. Flat-fee pricing may appeal strongly to CFOs and legal operations managers seeking to avoid “seat creep”—the gradual escalation of costs as users and cross-functional stakeholders are onboarded.
Companies interested in Cubed’s flat-fee model should assess whether the offered level of functionality matches their needs, especially when compared against similarly priced but more deeply featured CLM platforms.
Additionally, Law Squared’s claim of rapid deployment could be diluted if integrations require significant custom work. As always, “fixed cost” should be clearly defined in any service agreement to avoid scope-creep and unanticipated expenses.
This aligns with contemporary software adoption models: users gravitate towards tools that are embedded in their existing workflows and require minimal training. By leveraging Microsoft 365’s familiar interfaces and authentication mechanisms, Cubed offers a lower psychological barrier to entry compared to purpose-built, siloed legal management platforms. Anecdotal feedback from early adopters (as quoted on Law Squared’s promotional materials) suggests a smoother onboarding experience and higher user satisfaction.
That said, a truly frictionless experience depends on Cubed maintaining feature parity with the most common legal workflows present in its target market. System limitations, lack of deep customization, or insufficient reporting functionality could erode its advantage if not actively developed and supported.
However, prospective customers must validate:
Cubed stands out by following a “use your own cloud” philosophy akin to solutions like HighQ (Thomson Reuters) or NetDocuments’ private cloud architectures, but with even deeper Microsoft-native alignment. Whether this approach will outperform larger, more feature-rich platforms will depend on the reality of in-house legal team requirements and risk tolerances rather than marketing rhetoric alone.
Early indications—rooted in Law Squared’s public descriptions and corroborated by Microsoft’s extensibility guidance—suggest that Cubed’s deployment model, security assurances, and data residency claims are feasible for organizations with typical legal operations needs. However, buyers should approach broader enterprise CLM comparisons with caution, scrutinizing the relative depth of features, the specifics of third-party integrations, and the evolving compliance context. Due diligence remains essential, especially in regulated industries or in settings where legal workflows are unusually complex.
For organizations looking to harmonize legal operations into their existing Microsoft 365 infrastructure, Cubed may represent an attractive and efficient frontier. Yet, as with any new platform, prudent legal and IT leaders should verify functionality, validate integration claims, and ensure all necessary compliance measures are baked in—before embracing a tech solution that, in its quest for simplicity, must not sacrifice the nuance or security demanded by modern legal practice.
Source: IT Brief Australia Law Squared launches Cubed platform for in-house legal teams
A Platform Born Inside Microsoft 365
Cubed enters a competitive legal tech landscape dominated by contract lifecycle management (CLM) solutions and enterprise legal management platforms. Law Squared positions Cubed’s native integration with Microsoft 365 as its standout feature. Rather than introducing a separate, standalone system, Cubed centralizes matter management, workflow automation, contract intake, and approval processes directly within an organization's familiar Microsoft environment.This tight integration taps into widely adopted corporate tools—namely Outlook, SharePoint, Power BI, and Microsoft Copilot. According to Law Squared, Cubed’s “out of the box” deployment can be completed within a single day, thereby bypassing the often lengthy and complex onboarding cycles typical of rival CLM systems. Unlike many competitors that require significant IT involvement, data migrations, and ongoing system maintenance, Cubed promises a frictionless transition for organizations already entrenched in Microsoft’s ecosystem.
Verifying The Claims: Is Rapid Deployment Possible?
Law Squared’s assertion of same-day deployment is ambitious by industry standards. Typical CLM solutions, especially those not natively embedded within Microsoft 365, can have implementation timelines ranging from several weeks to months depending on system complexity, legacy integrations, and data migration requirements. However, Cubed sidesteps many of these hurdles by working with clients’ existing identity management (via Microsoft Azure Active Directory), storage (SharePoint/OneDrive), and collaboration tools.A review of Microsoft’s official documentation confirms that custom applications leveraging the Microsoft Graph API can seamlessly integrate into Outlook, SharePoint, and Teams with appropriate organizational permissions. Since Cubed claims not to store any client data externally and operates entirely within the organization’s existing Microsoft tenant, its accelerated deployment timeline appears feasible—provided the client’s IT policies do not impose additional review processes and that no substantial customizations are required. Nonetheless, organizations with more complex governance, risk, or compliance requirements may still face extended internal approval phases.
Addressing Legal Team Pain Points
Legal operations platforms have often struggled to gain mass adoption inside enterprise legal teams due to four recurring issues:- Tool Sprawl: The proliferation of separate, specialized platforms leads to fragmented workflows and duplicated data.
- High Per-User Costs: Many SaaS legal tech vendors license their products on a per-seat basis, quickly escalating total cost of ownership for larger teams.
- Low User Adoption: Feature-rich but unintuitive systems go underutilized when end-users find them cumbersome or misaligned with daily routines.
- Data Residency & Security: External vendors often store confidential client data, raising concerns about data residency, compliance, and sovereignty.
- Centralizing legal operations within Microsoft 365, thereby reducing the adoption friction associated with learning new systems.
- Charging a flat annual fee with no per-user licensing, making cost projections more predictable and potentially reducing expenditure, particularly in larger legal departments.
- Offering “fixed cost” integrations for popular business tools like DocuSign, HubSpot, and Salesforce.
- Ensuring that all data remains within the organization's own Microsoft environment to meet data sovereignty and security requirements.
Are Legal Teams Ready for Tech Consolidation?
Gartner’s research, referenced by Law Squared, indicates that up to 50% of an in-house legal team’s daily workload consists of “routine” tasks—intake, triage, contract drafting, approvals, and reporting. Streamlining these processes reduces wasted time and strengthens legal’s value proposition to the business.However, some legal professionals caution that “consolidation” may come at the expense of deep functionality. Specialized CLM platforms often include advanced AI-driven contract analytics, negotiation workflows, clause libraries, and regulatory tracking features not typically available from simpler toolkits. Cubed’s focus on rapid deployment and ease-of-use makes it a strong fit for teams seeking an immediate reduction in administrative friction, but may not be ideal for enterprises with unusually complex regulatory or contract review requirements.
Security and Data Sovereignty Claims
Security is central to any legal operations platform. By operating wholly within the customer’s Microsoft 365 tenant, Cubed avoids holding any client data itself. This is a marked difference from many SaaS legal platforms, which require transmission and storage of sensitive data on the vendor’s infrastructure.Microsoft 365 offers enterprise-grade security features, including tenant isolation, multi-factor authentication, encryption-at-rest, and comprehensive logging (as documented in the Microsoft Service Trust Portal). Provided Cubed does not introduce new APIs that transmit information outside this boundary, Law Squared’s security claims are well aligned with best practices for corporate data governance.
However, security experts emphasize that integrations with external systems (e.g., DocuSign, HubSpot, Salesforce) are only as secure as their configurations. Fixed-cost add-ons must be reviewed for compliance with both internal and external regulatory requirements. Additionally, organizations must remain vigilant about privilege access management; even tightly scoped applications can become entry points if not regularly monitored and updated in step with Microsoft’s evolving security model.
Pricing Model: Flat Fee Versus Per-User Licensing
Cubed eschews the legal tech industry’s often-criticized per-user pricing in favor of an annual flat fee that covers the entire organization, regardless of headcount. For larger legal teams, this can result in significant cost efficiencies; for smaller teams, particularly solo in-house counsel operations, it may still offer value through predictability and reduced administrative overhead.For context, Gartner’s 2023 Market Guide for CLM notes that per-user pricing remains the dominant model among cloud CLM vendors, with annual costs ranging from $600 to $2,400 per user, depending on required features and contract volumes. Flat-fee pricing may appeal strongly to CFOs and legal operations managers seeking to avoid “seat creep”—the gradual escalation of costs as users and cross-functional stakeholders are onboarded.
Companies interested in Cubed’s flat-fee model should assess whether the offered level of functionality matches their needs, especially when compared against similarly priced but more deeply featured CLM platforms.
Integration with Business Tools: The Practicalities
Cubed advertises fixed-cost integrations with widely used business solutions such as DocuSign for e-signatures, HubSpot for CRM, and Salesforce for customer data. Integration between Microsoft 365 and these platforms is well supported, both via vendor APIs and Microsoft’s own Power Automate service. However, successful implementation depends on clear scope definition; organizations should clarify which data fields, contract templates, and approval chains are supported out-of-the-box versus those requiring custom consulting or development.Additionally, Law Squared’s claim of rapid deployment could be diluted if integrations require significant custom work. As always, “fixed cost” should be clearly defined in any service agreement to avoid scope-creep and unanticipated expenses.
User Experience and Adoption: Removing “The Tech Burden”
A recurring theme in Law Squared’s positioning is the removal of the “tech burden” for in-house legal teams. Founder and Director Demetrio Zema stresses familiarity, simplicity, and scalability as fundamental criteria.This aligns with contemporary software adoption models: users gravitate towards tools that are embedded in their existing workflows and require minimal training. By leveraging Microsoft 365’s familiar interfaces and authentication mechanisms, Cubed offers a lower psychological barrier to entry compared to purpose-built, siloed legal management platforms. Anecdotal feedback from early adopters (as quoted on Law Squared’s promotional materials) suggests a smoother onboarding experience and higher user satisfaction.
That said, a truly frictionless experience depends on Cubed maintaining feature parity with the most common legal workflows present in its target market. System limitations, lack of deep customization, or insufficient reporting functionality could erode its advantage if not actively developed and supported.
Compliance, Data Residency, and IT Approval Bottlenecks
By operating within Microsoft 365, Cubed can, in theory, comply with corporate IT and data sovereignty requirements more easily than external SaaS platforms. Many global organizations already have robust compliance certifications for their Microsoft environments, including ISO 27001, SOC 2, and GDPR. This sidesteps common IT approval bottlenecks associated with onboarding net-new vendors or platforms.However, prospective customers must validate:
- That Cubed does not trigger additional audit requirements (e.g., for integrated e-signature or CRM tools).
- Whether lawyer–client privilege, professional responsibility obligations, or industry-specific mandates (such as HIPAA in health care or APRA in finance) impose requirements above and beyond baseline Microsoft 365 protections.
- What ongoing vendor support is available for compliance incidents or data residency challenges.
Market Differentiation: Strengths and Risks
Notable Strengths
- Native Microsoft 365 Integration: No external infrastructure or third-party data processing.
- Rapid Deployment: Claimed to be operational within one day (supported by Microsoft 365 extensibility frameworks for non-customized deployments).
- Flat-Fee Pricing: Reduces budgeting headaches and user caps.
- Data Sovereignty: All client data remains within the organization's Microsoft tenant by default.
- Familiar UX: Leveraging established Outlook, SharePoint, and Power BI interfaces lowers adoption resistance.
Potential Risks and Weaknesses
- Feature Depth: Advanced contract analytics or highly specialized matter management features may lag behind best-in-class, standalone CLM platforms.
- Custom Integration Complexity: Integration with third-party systems could become complicated if out-of-the-box options are insufficient for unique organizational requirements.
- Security and Compliance Overlaps: Integrations with non-Microsoft business tools introduce governance questions that must be addressed proactively.
- Limited Applicability Outside Microsoft Ecosystems: Firms not standardized on Microsoft 365 will find Cubed less attractive or incompatible.
The Competitive Landscape
The CLM and legal operations software market is crowded, featuring both established players (e.g., DocuSign CLM, Ironclad, Agiloft, ContractPodAi) and newer entrants pursuing different approaches to automation and workflow integration. Most leading vendors tout robust features, scalable architectures, and deep integrations—but commonly rely on external, vendor-managed cloud environments.Cubed stands out by following a “use your own cloud” philosophy akin to solutions like HighQ (Thomson Reuters) or NetDocuments’ private cloud architectures, but with even deeper Microsoft-native alignment. Whether this approach will outperform larger, more feature-rich platforms will depend on the reality of in-house legal team requirements and risk tolerances rather than marketing rhetoric alone.
Conclusion: Promise and Prudence for Corporate Legal Teams
Law Squared’s Cubed addresses a genuine pain point: the deployment and operation of legal tech should not add complexity or risk to already burdened legal departments. By embedding core legal operations functions inside the familiar and secure Microsoft 365 suite, Cubed offers a straightforward proposition for in-house teams seeking rapid ROI, lower IT barriers, and predictable pricing.Early indications—rooted in Law Squared’s public descriptions and corroborated by Microsoft’s extensibility guidance—suggest that Cubed’s deployment model, security assurances, and data residency claims are feasible for organizations with typical legal operations needs. However, buyers should approach broader enterprise CLM comparisons with caution, scrutinizing the relative depth of features, the specifics of third-party integrations, and the evolving compliance context. Due diligence remains essential, especially in regulated industries or in settings where legal workflows are unusually complex.
For organizations looking to harmonize legal operations into their existing Microsoft 365 infrastructure, Cubed may represent an attractive and efficient frontier. Yet, as with any new platform, prudent legal and IT leaders should verify functionality, validate integration claims, and ensure all necessary compliance measures are baked in—before embracing a tech solution that, in its quest for simplicity, must not sacrifice the nuance or security demanded by modern legal practice.
Source: IT Brief Australia Law Squared launches Cubed platform for in-house legal teams
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