New Law Academy programme will help young lawyers with ethical GenAI use, difficult clients
Source: Straits Times
Article Date: 22 May 2025
Author: Samuel Devaraj
The Junior Lawyers Professional Certification Programme (JLP) will address key challenges facing the legal industry, including high attrition rates and limited practical training, as well as the growing impact of GenAI on legal work.
A new programme launched by the Singapore Academy of Law (SAL) on May 21 is aimed at supporting young lawyers in areas such as the ethical use of generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) and dealing with difficult clients.
SAL said in a press release that the Junior Lawyers Professional Certification Programme will address key challenges facing the legal industry, including high attrition rates and limited practical training, as well as the growing impact of GenAI on legal work.
Open to lawyers with under five years of post-qualification experience, the programme offers practical training in disputes and corporate practice, imparts management skills and reinforces principles of professional ethics.
Its opening conference, which is compulsory for participants to attend, was held at the Parkroyal Collection Marina Bay hotel on May 21.
Speaking at the event, SAL's chief executive Yeong Zee Kin said the wave of technological disruption, in particular GenAI, has 'smashed into the shores of legal practice'.
He said AI will automate many entry-level legal tasks, affecting the learning opportunities for young lawyers.
The clients also expect more from lawyers, since online tools are available that can generate contracts and produce litigation strategies that look very sound and sound very credible.
Mr Yeong said: 'The profession can no longer afford to wait four to eight years for lawyers to 'grow into' their roles.
'(The Junior Lawyers Professional Certification Programme) is our first step in answering and meeting these tectonic shifts. Developed with support from the Institute for Adult Learning, it introduces new pedagogies to accelerate the development of legal insight, strategic thinking and judgment.
'We want our junior lawyers to take flight – and (the new programme) provides that shorter runway that they need.'
For example, a programme module participants can select helps them to prepare for, deal with, and assist in civil trial proceedings.
Another module covers cross-examining witnesses in such court proceedings.
The module on legal innovation focuses on the application of legal tech tools and GenAI in practice, while the one on client management covers interviewing clients and dealing with the difficult ones.
Other modules include those on understanding financial statements and cross-border contract drafting and negotiation.
SAL said course participants may be self-funded or sponsored by law firms.
It is also working with SkillsFuture Singapore to secure funding of up to 70 per cent of costs for eligible individuals and small and medium-sized enterprises.
At the opening conference, Chief Justice Sundaresh Menon highlighted the changing nature of legal work and the more challenging environment in which lawyers operate.
He also cited a survey conducted at the 2025 admission ceremony for lawyers, in which around 60 per cent of the respondents indicated that they were likely to move out of legal practice within the next five years to pursue an in-house career, employment in academia or employment with other legal service providers.
A third of the respondents had also indicated that they were likely to leave the legal profession altogether in that time, he noted.
Chief Justice Menon said the most commonly cited reasons were excessive workload or poor work-life balance, a higher salary or compensation package elsewhere, the impact work had on their mental well-being, a lack of flexibility in their working arrangements and poor workplace culture.
Noting that he had on previous occasions explained why such findings ought to be of significant concern, he added: 'I have also suggested how we might go about addressing this challenge, such as by ensuring that law firms develop concrete policies to implement sustainable workplace practices, and by communicating and instilling the values foundational to the practice of law.'
Mr Shashi Nathan, a joint managing partner at Withers KhattarWong, told The Straits Times that the new programme can help young lawyers develop practical, transferable skills that are essential for long-term success in the profession.
'Structured exposure to topics such as client handling, legal project management and ethical judgment helps junior lawyers build confidence and develop a more holistic understanding of their role,' he said.
Source: The Straits Times © SPH Media Limited. Permission required for reproduction.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
CNA
29 minutes ago
- CNA
Exclusive-SK Hynix expects AI memory market to grow 30% a year to 2030
SEOUL/SAN FRANCISCO :South Korea's SK Hynix forecasts that the market for a specialized form of memory chip designed for artificial intelligence will grow 30 per cent a year until 2030, a senior executive said in an interview with Reuters. The upbeat projection for global growth in high-bandwidth memory (HBM) for use in AI brushes off concern over rising price pressures in a sector that for decades has been treated like commodities such as oil or coal. "AI demand from the end user is pretty much, very firm and strong," said SK Hynix's Choi Joon-yong, the head of HBM business planning at SK Hynix. The billions of dollars in AI capital spending that cloud computing companies such as Amazon, Microsoft and Alphabet's Google are projecting will likely be revised upwards in the future, which would be "positive" for the HBM market, Choi said. The relationship between AI build-outs and HBM purchases is "very straightforward" and there is a correlation between the two, Choi said. SK Hynix's projections are conservative and include constraints such as available energy, he said. But the memory business is undergoing a significant strategic change during this period as well. HBM - a type of dynamic random access memory or DRAM standard first produced in 2013 - involves stacking chips vertically to save space and reduce power consumption, helping to process the large volumes of data generated by complex AI applications. SK Hynix expects this market for custom HBM to grow to tens of billions of dollars by 2030, Choi said. Due to technological changes in the way SK Hynix and rivals such as Micron Technology and Samsung Electronics build next-generation HBM4, their products include a customer-specific logic die, or "base die", that helps manage the memory. That means it is no longer possible to easily replace a rival's memory product with a nearly identical chip or product. Part of SK Hynix's optimism for future HBM market growth includes the likelihood that customers will want even further customisation than what SK Hynix already does, Choi said. At the moment it is mostly larger customers such as Nvidia that receive individual customisation, while smaller clients get a traditional one-size-fits-all approach. "Each customer has different taste," Choi said, adding that some want specific performance or power characteristics. SK Hynix is currently the main HBM supplier to Nvidia, although Samsung and Micron supply it with smaller volumes. Last week, Samsung cautioned during its earnings conference call that current generation HBM3E supply would likely outpace demand growth in the near term, a shift that could weigh on prices. "We are confident to provide, to make the right competitive product to the customers," Choi said. 100 per cent TARIFFS U.S. President Donald Trump on Wednesday said the United States would impose a tariff of about 100 per cent on semiconductor chips imported from countries not producing in America or planning to do so. Choi declined to comment on the tariffs. Trump told reporters in the Oval Office the new tariff rate would apply to "all chips and semiconductors coming into the United States," but would not apply to companies that were already manufacturing in the United States or had made a commitment to do so. Trump's comments were not a formal tariff announcement, and the president offered no further specifics. South Korea's top trade envoy Yeo Han-koo said on Thursday that Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix would not be subject to the 100 per cent tariffs on chips if they were implemented. Samsung has invested in two chip fabrication plants in Austin and Taylor, Texas, and SK Hynix has announced plans to build an advanced chip packaging plant and an artificial intelligence research and development facility in Indiana. South Korea's chip exports to the United States were valued at $10.7 billion last year, accounting for 7.5 per cent of its total chip exports. Some HBM chips are exported to Taiwan for packaging, accounting for 18 per cent of South Korea's chip exports in 2024, a 127 per cent increase from the previous year.
Business Times
19 hours ago
- Business Times
Ex-OpenAI, DeepMind staffers set for US$1 billion value in Andreessen-led round
[NEW YORK] Venture firm Andreessen Horowitz has agreed to lead a US$200 million investment in Periodic Labs, a new startup building artificial intelligence (AI) for material science, according to people familiar with the matter. The agreement values Periodic Labs at US$1 billion before the investment, an impressive price for a months-old company, according to the people, who asked not to be identified because the information is private. OpenAI had previously agreed to lead the investment, but Periodic Labs decided that Andreessen Horowitz could offer more resources, one of the people said. OpenAI is still expected to participate in the financing and potentially team up with the company, the person said. The round hasn't closed, and terms of the deal could change. Andreessen Horowitz didn't respond to a request for comment. Spokespeople for Periodic Labs and OpenAI declined to comment. Periodic Labs was founded by Liam Fedus, OpenAI's former vice-president of research and a key member of the team that launched ChatGPT, and Ekin Dogus Cubuk, a former research scientist at Google's DeepMind AI division. The idea is to use AI to study materials and potentially discover new ones. The Information earlier reported some details of Periodic Labs' fundraising plans. BT in your inbox Start and end each day with the latest news stories and analyses delivered straight to your inbox. Sign Up Sign Up Little has been shared about the new venture. In a March tweet announcing his departure from OpenAI, Fedus said he was excited about AI for science. He called it 'one of the most strategically important areas' for OpenAI and said the company planned to 'invest in and partner' with Periodic Labs. Fedus is part of a growing group of former OpenAI staffers launching their own ventures, a cadre that's drawn comparisons to the 'PayPal mafia', a group of prolific entrepreneurs including Elon Musk and Peter Thiel. Anthropic, the OpenAI rival, was started by ex-OpenAI executives Dario and Daniela Amodei. Thinking Machines Lab, recently valued at US$10 billion, was founded by former OpenAI executive Mira Murati. Investors are jostling for stakes in startups launched by alumni of OpenAI and other AI pioneers and are willing to pay lofty prices for what they see as rare talent. At the same time, larger companies are trying to retain employees with massive compensation packages worth hundreds of millions. Several other OpenAI employees – including Rhythm Garg, Linden Li and Yash Patil – recently exited the company to launch a startup called Applied Compute. The startup quickly raised funding from Benchmark, Bloomberg reported. Benchmark's investment valued Applied Compute at US$100 million, Upstarts Media reported. That's still remarkably high for such an early-stage deal, though it pales in comparison with the valuation that Periodic Labs commanded – thanks to Fedus' central role in creating ChatGPT. BLOOMBERG
Straits Times
20 hours ago
- Straits Times
Yomiuri sues US AI startup over use of articles; Perplexity allegedly used over 100,000 news stories
In 2024, Perplexity had another lawsuit filed against it by Dow Jones and another company. Three Yomiuri Shimbun newspaper companies have filed a lawsuit against a US startup company that allegedly used a large number of Yomiuri Shimbun articles and images for a generative AI-powered search engine without permission. The Yomiuri Shimbun; The Yomiuri Shimbun, Osaka; and The Yomiuri Shimbun, Seibu filed the lawsuit demanding that Perplexity AI stop using the newspaper's articles and seeking damages of about ¥2.17 billion (S$18.8 million) in the Tokyo District Court on Aug 7. The three companies are under The Yomiuri Shimbun Holdings. This is the first time a major Japanese media company has filed such a lawsuit, although several AI-related businesses in Europe and the United States have been taken to court for the unauthorised use of copyrighted material by generative artificial intelligence (AI). Established in 2022, Perplexity provides a search service that parses the latest online information to compile answers to questions typed in by users. A conventional search engine will display a list of websites related to the search terms entered by a user, but Perplexity pitches its service as an 'answer engine' that summarises information gleaned online. This enables users to acquire information they want without looking through individual websites. In its lawsuit, The Yomiuri Shimbun claims that Perplexity copied articles from the Yomiuri Shimbun Online (YOL) digital service and sent answers with content similar to these articles to its users. The Yomiuri Shimbun claims this violated the right of reproduction and the right to public transmission under the copyright law. Perplexity allegedly acquired 119,467 Yomiuri articles without permission between February and June 2025, for the purpose of generating answers for its users. The Yomiuri Shimbun decided to seek damages of ¥16,500 per article, calculated based on a regular licensing fee. The amount of compensation being sought could increase depending on the findings of a further investigation. Top stories Swipe. Select. Stay informed. Singapore Four men arrested in Bukit Timah believed to be linked to housebreaking syndicates Singapore Profile of Kpod user has shifted from hardcore drug users to young people: Experts Tech Former data analyst creates AI tutor that assesses students based on Singapore schools' criteria Opinion Recognising our imperfections is part of what makes Singapore whole Opinion I used to be impatient. Then I became a granddad Business The risks of using 'decoupling' to own two properties World Thousands protest in Tel Aviv against Israeli govt move to expand Gaza war Asia Manila struggles to keep a lasting hawker culture, casts eyes on how Asian nations lifted street food In addition, conventional search engines encourage users to visit the YOL service, which generates advertising revenue for The Yomiuri Shimbun. However, Perplexity's service results in fewer online visits to the YOL. The Yomiuri Shimbun claims that this is causing a drop in advertising revenue, which also constitutes an infringement of its business interests. About 2,500 reporters are involved in news coverage for The Yomiuri Shimbun. Consequently, the newspaper believes Perplexity has been getting a 'free ride' on the activities of a media organisation that devotes 'great effort and expense' to creating news articles. The Yomiuri Shimbun also is seeking compensation for lost advertising income. In response to The Yomiuri Shimbun's emailed request for comment, Perplexity sent a message that said: 'We are deeply sorry for the misunderstanding this has caused in Japan. We are currently working hard to understand the nature of the claims. We take this very seriously, because Perplexity is committed to ensuring that publishers and journalists benefit from the new business models that will arise in the AI age.' In October 2024, Dow Jones, a division of News Corp, filed a lawsuit together with another company alleging copyright infringement by Perplexity. That case is pending in federal district court in New York. Perplexity has rejected the claims in that case and insists that its search function is based on publicly available facts that are not protected by copyright laws. Yomiuri warns of negative impact The Yomiuri Shimbun Holdings' Corporate Communications Department issued a statement that said: 'Allowing a company to free ride on the results of our reporting would negatively affect our accurate news coverage backed by our research, and could undermine the foundations of democracy. We hope this lawsuit will raise questions about rules on the rapidly spreading use of generative AI and how it should be used and applied.' THE JAPAN NEWS/ASIA NEWS NETWORK
