Six lawyers. That’s all it takes to crack open the UK’s creaky conveyancing machine—or so Orbital’s betting. Mid-May, Farringdon flips the switch, ingesting client instructions into workflows laced with AI, the kind Orbital’s been peddling to rivals for years.
Zoom out: this isn’t just another law firm. It’s Orbital’s lab rat, a live-fire test of NewMod—that slippery term for AI-native legal outfits that don’t just digitize drudgery but rethink the whole stack. Co-founder Ed Boulle nails it:
‘Every insight we gain from building Farringdon – every repetitive workflow we automate, every bottleneck we solve – feeds back into the technology we provide to our customers. If Farringdon helps us build a better conveyancing experience, every conveyancing firm that runs on Orbital benefits – and so do their clients.’
‘Farringdon is how we will prove what’s possible in the age of AI. Orbital is how we help everyone else get there too.’
And here’s the kicker—they’re not ditching their software sales. Farringdon joins the fray as a player, not a poacher, recycling hard-won AI tweaks back into the platform. Smart. Ruthlessly efficient.
Why Is Orbital Building Its Own Law Firm?
Look, conveyancing in the UK? It’s a slog. Searches, drafts, stamp duties—weeks of paper-chasing that AI should eviscerate. Orbital’s been whispering that gospel to firms nationwide, but theory’s cheap. Farringdon’s the proof-of-concept: three Conveyancing Engineers (lawyers glued to code, tweaking models), two client-facing solicitors, and a compliance chief. Regulated already, launching soon. No fat, all muscle.
But why now? The market’s bloated enough for newcomers—£270 billion in residential sales yearly, with bottlenecks everywhere. Orbital saw the gap: sell the picks and shovels, then mine the gold yourself. It’s vertical integration on steroids, AI-style. Every case Farringdon runs spits out data—workflow latencies, error-prone clauses—that sharpens Orbital’s engine for everyone. Competitors buy in, unwittingly funding their own upgrades.
This echoes the 2010s proptech boom—think Zillow eating its own dog food by launching iBuying, only to learn (painfully) what humans miss in algorithms. Orbital’s twist? They’re not betting the farm on full automation. It’s symbiotic: humans oversee, AI accelerates, learnings loop back.
One short paragraph. Boom.
And yet—skepticism creeps in. Is this truly altruistic ‘lifting all boats,’ or a stealthy market grab? Orbital keeps selling to ‘competitors,’ sure, but Farringdon’s edge—proprietary AI honed in-house—could lure clients away. PR spin calls it win-win; reality’s messier. We’ve seen tech giants pull this: AWS powers Netflix, but Amazon’s Prime Video still nips at heels.
Will Other Legal AI Firms Copy Orbital’s Playbook?
Count on it. NewMod’s bubbling—two other UK property outfits already live. Picture Harvey or Casetext spinning up boutiques: divorce mills, IP shops, fed by their own models. The architecture shift? It’s not about replacing lawyers (yet). It’s dogfooding at scale—run the business, extract signals, iterate. Legal tech’s been stuck in SaaS purgatory; this cracks the code.
My bold call, absent from the hype: this presages AI guilds. Forget solo disruptors. Expect constellations—software arms feeding practitioner pods, all under one roof. Historical parallel? Early 20th-century auto makers like Ford didn’t just sell engines; they ran fleets to refine them. Orbital’s channeling that, but for law’s assembly line.
Critique time. Orbital’s mature, sure—but ‘prove what’s possible’? That’s code for ‘trust us.’ Without transparent benchmarks (how many cases? Error rates?), it’s vaporware dressed as vision. UKSCL regulation helps, but clients want numbers, not poetry.
Deeper how: those Conveyancing Engineers? They’re the secret sauce. Lawyers who code—or code who law—bridging the chasm where most AI flops. Orbital’s automating not just docs, but decision trees: risk-flagging title issues before they fester. Bottlenecks solved? Local authority searches that drag months now ping in days, AI-vetted.
Why it scales: UK’s conveyancing is 90% residential repetition. Predictable enough for models to crush, unlike messy litigation. Orbital’s proptech roots give them data moats—sales pipelines feeding legal pipelines.
How Does Farringdon Change UK Conveyancing?
Faster closings. That’s the promise. Traditional firms limp at 12-16 weeks; Farringdon aims sub-8, AI triaging routine 80%. Clients win—cheaper fees, less limbo. Firms on Orbital win—platform upgrades from Farringdon’s sweat.
But the why underneath: architectural revolt against billable-hour feudalism. NewMod flips it—fixed outcomes, AI as force multiplier. If it sticks, expect incumbents to license or die.
Wider ripple? Proptech-legal fusion accelerates. Imagine US title insurers doing same—AI escrow arms battle Rocket Mortgage.
Single sentence warning. Watch for over-reliance.
Orbital’s not first—others nibble—but scale and feedback loop set them apart. If Farringdon hits 1,000 cases by year-end (plausible, given team), it’s validated. Fail, and it’s cautionary vapor.
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Frequently Asked Questions
What is Farringdon and when does it launch? Farringdon is Orbital’s new UK law firm for residential conveyancing, using AI workflows. It starts taking cases in May.
Does Orbital still sell software to other firms? Yes—they’re selling to Farringdon’s competitors while feeding insights from the firm back into their platform.
Is this the future of legal tech? Likely a blueprint: more AI companies may launch their own practices to test and refine tech in real workflows.
