Reimagining the Legal Industry: Pathways to 2040

Last autumn in Austin, Texas, we brought together investors, general counsel, technologists and industry leaders to confront a simple but uncomfortable question: what if the legal industry in 2040 looks little like the one we know today?

The gathering formed part of Pathways: A Roadmap for In House Teams, led by The LegalTech Fund in partnership with LinkSquares and ALM, with Leaders’ Quest designing and facilitating the process. Together, we explored how the legal ecosystem might evolve toward 2040 under the accelerating impact of artificial intelligence, interoperable data and new forms of capital.

The Three Horizons framework provided the structure for this exploration. It enabled participants to examine the system across time: what must be optimised in today’s model, what experiments signal transition, and what future architecture could redefine the industry altogether.

AI Quests: Leadership in a time of intelligence transformation

There are moments when the future arrives gradually, and moments when it arrives all at once.

The strange thing about this moment is that many leaders we speak to are not sure which one they are in.

Artificial intelligence is moving at a pace that feels both incremental and exponential. There is a steady accumulation of small shifts: new tools, new capabilities, new workflows. And then there are moments that feel like a break in the pattern, when something becomes possible that simply was not possible before.

Many leaders we are working with are facing into a familiar dilemma in new circumstances. Move too slowly and you risk irrelevance. Move too fast and you risk breaking trust, culture, and the very human systems organisations rely on.

We see this moment as one that is moving from digital transformation to intelligence transformation. Because what is shifting is not only the technology itself, but the conditions in which insight, judgement and decisions are made across organisations and societies.

Recoding culture: leading transformation in the AI era

As AI reshapes business at unprecedented speed, the real challenge for leaders isn’t technical — it’s cultural. At the Digital Leadership Agenda 2026, one theme stood out: transformation succeeds when people lead with curiosity, courage, and connection. True progress depends on mindset, not machines. To thrive in the AI era, leaders must “recode” culture — building trust, learning fast, and putting human values at the heart of innovation.