Lawyers set to pass M&A paperwork to machines

Could robots soon take over the legal drudge work that slows down so many mergers and acquisitions? Luminance, a start-up backed by Mike Lynch, the British technology investor, is aiming to reduce the time taken on due diligence that accompanies multimillion-pound M&A deals from weeks to days or even hours using a new form of artificial intelligence. Its new software deploys machine learning to read and "think" like a lawyer. Scanning hundreds of pages of complex documents a minute, it can spot anomalies and potential pain points in contracts and other corporate paperwork.