Challenge: High rates and slow turnarounds make reliance on outside counsel unsustainable

Onex’s private equity business has two separate platforms: the large-cap Onex Partners and the middle-market ONCAP. Prior to 2015, both platforms worked with outside law firms to process their NDAs. However, rising hourly rates and slower turnaround times led the firm to reassess its approach.

Onex needed a more cost-effective way for each platform to manage NDAs that didn’t strain the deal team’s bandwidth. According to Colin Sam, VP & Associate General Counsel at Onex, “Our deal team looks at hundreds of transactions a year, but we don’t have a big legal group. I don’t have the bandwidth to manage all those NDAs and ancillary documents, but I also don’t want my deal team turning contracts, adding comments, and coming up with language. That’s not where their time or skills are best suited.”

Solution: Contract Automation streamlines routine legal workflows at a faster price

In May 2015, Onex began using Ontra’s AI-powered Contract Automation solution to handle routine legal agreements for its middle-market private equity platform. During a short and seamless onboarding, the Ontra team worked with Onex to develop a comprehensive playbook and iron out a new workflow for NDAs and ancillary documents. The middle-market platform was quickly up and running.

Previously, several deal team members on One Platform handled the tedious, time-consuming tasks associated with NDA management: drafting, negotiating, reviewing ancillary documents, etc. Contract Automation automated these processes, helping the firm save time and reduce and stabilize costs.

As private markets evolved, outside counsel fees shot up, and legal technology solutions providers grew more popular, Onex’s large-cap platform engaged with Ontra and began using Contract Automation in 2022. The industry was increasingly accepting that white-shoe advisory and legal firms weren’t necessarily the best solution for routine legal agreements.

Sam emphasized that law firms simply couldn’t keep up with Onex’s needs: “Transactions kept getting larger and more complex, and the demands were getting harder in terms of global conflict searches, so outside counsel was taking a while to get started on helping us. Sometimes, it would be 48 hours before they could even look at an NDA. But with the market moving so quickly, we needed same-day service that many law firms couldn’t accommodate.”

Previously, the deal teams on both platforms had a lot on their plates, including managing and building financial models, due diligence, and working with management and industry experts — high-value tasks that couldn’t be outsourced. Delegating NDA work to Ontra allowed these professionals to focus their efforts on strategic work without getting bogged down by a high volume of routine contracts.

“By taking the time-consuming work of drafting, negotiating, and handling the back-and-forth of inbound NDAs and outbound joinders off our plates, Ontra frees up an extra hour or two a week for each team member. That gives them more time for more high-value tasks and keeps them from being in the office late into the night,” Sam explained, “Overall, the team is happy, we’re moving along, and things are working well.”