I am reasonably sure that I will not find time to read the 2,200 page Valukas Report on the collapse of Lehman Brothers. Fortunately, Gregory Bufithis of The Posse List has extracted from it the description of the electronic discovery exercise which Anton Valukas, the examiner appointed by the U.S. Bankruptcy Trustee, undertook in the preparation of his report (see The Valukas Report on the Lehman Brothers collapse and e-discovery — Stratify and CaseLogistix win the day .

The chief interest to me, apart from the staggering volumes of documents involved (to say nothing of the 2600 software systems and applications in use at Lehmans) is that two of the e-Disclosure Information Project sponsors, Stratify and Anacomp’s CaseLogistix, emerged as the systems of choice for the investigation. More than 70 contract attorneys, in addition to lawyers from the retained law firms, conducted first first-pass reviews using these two systems.

The report, in the version which I found (Volume 1 is here) does not readily allow the text to be copied, so if you want to see for yourself what the Examiner said in describing his task, start at the foot of page numbered 30 (the 74th page of the file). Complications included the fact that the bankruptcy petition came with almost no notice, and the fact that Barclays (who took over much of the Lehman business and systems), intermingled their own current data with what they had inherited.

I will leave you to read Greg’s summary and, if you have a week or so, the report. When you come to draw up a shortlist for your next major project, CaseLogistix and Stratify will presumably be on it, together, perhaps with Recommind and Index Engines whose technologies are also mentioned in the article.

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