Patrick Forquer on Selling Legal AI and Scaling Legora’s Revenue Team

Legora chief revenue officer Patrick Forquer joins Harry Stebbings to discuss selling AI to law firms, building a global team and forecasting in a fast-moving market. The interview concerns a company in which Stebbings's firm 20VC has invested; its financial figures and sales results are presented as the company's or speakers' accounts.

Forquer spent six years at Braze, where enterprise software implementations could take six to twelve months. His central lesson was that signing a deal is only the beginning: a customer must actually adopt a product and find value in it. At Legora, he says, the team puts executive sponsorship and implementation support into the process early.

The practical work is different when an AI agent is involved. Rather than configure a known set of software features, the team has to understand what a lawyer wants to accomplish, examine the workflow and help develop it. Forquer describes bringing legal and technical people together with the customer, investing human time up front so the product can become useful.

That involvement influences what Legora sells and how it staffs accounts. Forquer says the company pairs commercial people with legal engineers who understand the customer's work, then uses the learning from deployments to improve its playbooks. He sees the work after the sale and the work before it as closely connected.

Asked whether salespeople should leave traditional SaaS for AI, Forquer describes a market moving so quickly that keeping current is a job in itself. Products and competitors change constantly, and teams have to take training seriously. The attraction is also the challenge: a salesperson who wants to keep pace must keep learning.

Forquer does not think all the old sales rules have disappeared. Preparation, understanding the customer's needs, building relationships and demonstrating value remain essential. What changes is the speed and the expectation that a prospective buyer can see the product work on a relevant problem early.

In the traditional enterprise playbook, a seller might spend a long time on discovery before showing a demo. Forquer argues that AI buyers often need to see an agent in action sooner to understand what is possible. The demonstration still needs to connect to their work; an impressive generic example is not a substitute for learning what they need.

Stebbings raises Legora's roughly $5.5 billion valuation and asks about the market behind it. The speakers discuss estimates of legal technology spending and the much larger legal-services market, which are their market-sizing arguments rather than established revenue available to any one company. The video's description says 20VC participated in Legora's funding round, so the host has an investment interest in the company.

Forquer says pipeline starts with knowing who the buyer is and which accounts are showing meaningful interest. The company scores and qualifies leads, then works to connect its technology with concrete needs. He sees brand awareness as especially valuable when legal buyers are deciding which emerging providers merit attention.

The conversation turns to Legora's campaign featuring actor Jude Law. Forquer says the company generated more than $50 million in qualified pipeline in a recent month; these are potential opportunities that passed its qualification process, not booked revenue. The interview does not establish how much of that total was caused by the campaign, and he does not give a comparable prior-month figure or campaign cost.

Forquer says the campaign was designed to make the brand recognizable, even though the creative did not appeal to everyone. In his account, the overall feedback was positive. Stebbings pushes for the commercial context behind the number, illustrating the distinction between attention, qualified opportunities and actual sales.

Stebbings asks about the competitive market, including Harvey. Forquer says the teams have to compete on product, deployment and the needs of particular lawyers, while being respectful of competitors. He describes a fast-moving market where a successful approach can be copied or overtaken and where Legora must defend existing business as well as pursue new accounts.

Forquer says Legora builds banks of legal use cases and tracks the workflows that customers are actually trying to run. A general claim that an AI product helps lawyers is less useful than showing how it can help a particular practice. The company's legal specialists help translate those needs into examples and workable pilots.

A litigation lawyer cannot automatically speak for an M&A practice, Forquer argues. Different groups do different work and need different demonstrations and champions. He prefers working in person where possible, with someone who understands the relevant legal field, while recognizing that a customer's location and working arrangements may make that difficult.

The question of price comes up as the market becomes more competitive. Stebbings asks whether the company should give the product away to win adoption. Forquer worries that a free offering can weaken the customer's commitment, and says the company tries to be flexible while preserving a serious process for evaluating and adopting the product.

Decision-making in legal services can involve more than a single buyer. Forquer notes that client relationships, influential partners and external networks can all shape a firm's choice. The sales team has to map those voices instead of assuming that a single enthusiastic contact can carry the decision.

Forquer stresses the details of running a pilot: identify the participants, get executive backing, complete the security review and agree on real use cases and success criteria. Sending access to a large group without a plan, in his experience, risks low engagement and a disappointing evaluation. He says execution matters because missing a key stakeholder or step can reduce the likelihood of a deal.

Senior access is easier when the proposed purchase matters to the organization's strategy, Forquer says. Rather than treating executive introductions as a box to tick, he tries to show how the deployment fits the firm's priorities and what the senior buyer needs to decide. References from comparable customers can also help a firm understand the commitment.

The sales process also depends on finding internal advocates across practices, not merely getting a meeting at the top. Forquer describes a market in which customers compare providers closely and talented hires are in demand. Both competition for deals and competition for experienced people require a clear account of what the company can deliver.

Investors can help open doors and provide context, Forquer says, particularly when they know a market or a prospective buyer. He cautions against treating an introduction as a replacement for doing the work: the commercial team still needs to earn the customer's trust and demonstrate value.

Legora is onboarding roughly 40 to 50 people every two weeks, according to Forquer. He contrasts that pace with a more predictable traditional SaaS operation: the product, organization and competitive environment can all change while a new cohort is learning. The onboarding program therefore has to be updated repeatedly, not built once and left alone.

New hires come to Stockholm for a concentrated first week. They learn the company, sales stages, legal market and product, with videos and written material supporting the live sessions. Forquer wants people to become productive quickly, but says that requires deliberate training across functions rather than simply handing a new representative a territory.

The team revises product education as releases arrive and tests what people have absorbed through practice. Role-playing discovery and demos gives managers a way to spot gaps before a salesperson is in front of a customer. Forquer says AI scoring of recorded calls can supplement human feedback; it does not replace coaching.

Forquer says he looks for early signs of productivity around 45 days and that some of the strongest representatives close deals in roughly 90 days. These are observations about Legora's experience, not a guaranteed ramp time. When hiring, he places particular weight on experience managing complex deals and organizational change.

Asked whether legal-sector experience or large-deal experience matters more, Forquer chooses the latter. He estimates annual contract values around $250,000 to $500,000 in some segments and says the company also does seven-figure deals. Those are his approximate figures and vary by segment; they do not describe every customer.

He recalls winning a competitive, medium seven-figure deal with an unnamed global law firm by coordinating teams across several regions during the pilot. The decision came down to an executive presentation involving Legora's CEO and the customer's leadership panel. In his telling, buyers assessed the people who would deliver the service as well as the product and the company's direction.

A lost deal offered a different lesson. Forquer says the team failed to build a relationship with one influential member of a decision panel, and he believes that gap mattered. The postmortem reinforced the need to understand a firm's sometimes opaque decision process and build relationships across it.

Relationships still matter, though Forquer says the old routine of steak lunches and dinners has evolved. He sees value in events that let customers meet the team and discuss relevant ideas. An executive dinner with a strong speaker can work well, he says, while the company learned that some conferences were not worth repeating after attending roughly one a week in the previous year.

On compensation, Forquer says Legora currently uses quota multiples of roughly eight to twelve times on-target earnings, depending on region and segment. He says the company arrives at its ranges through a bottom-up view of ramp time, productivity, recurring revenue per representative and territory pipeline, rather than simply copying another company's multiple.

Forquer says average quota attainment was 280% in the previous year and acknowledges that this suggests his targets were poorly set. He recalls joining when the business was around $3.5 million in annual recurring revenue, reaching $25 million in the third quarter and ending the year at $70 million before crossing $100 million earlier this year. These are his reported ARR run-rate figures, not realized annual revenue.

Rapid growth made long-range forecasting difficult. Forquer says he gave the board guidance on a rolling six-month basis and now feels more confident about top-line forecasting as the company gathers pipeline data. Individual results remain more volatile, including unexpected large deals and opportunities opened and closed within the same quarter.

His approach combines two forecasts. Representatives make a serious commitment to what they expect to close, managers roll those commitments up through the regions, and Forquer compares the result with a weighted forecast based on deal stages. He says the two methods agreed last quarter and were both reasonably accurate for that period.

The weighted forecast is only useful if the underlying opportunity records are maintained. Forquer says each stage needs simple entry and exit criteria: for example, a qualified opportunity involves a discovery conversation, and moving toward a pilot may require a buying process, budget, executive support and security work. Historical conversion rates then inform the weights.

Forquer believes AI companies face pressure to expand internationally quickly. He says Legora followed inbound demand when opening in markets including India, while the Asia-Pacific region has been especially complex to enter. He describes differences in data hosting and processing requirements and model availability as practical issues that can require product and infrastructure work.

The discussion turns to data sovereignty and national preferences. Forquer says he encounters buyers who pay attention to whether a vendor is European or American, alongside questions about local legal context and where data is processed. These are his observations from deals, not a claim that every buyer or jurisdiction behaves alike.

Growth also strains the infrastructure behind sales. Billing, reporting, changes to pricing and CRM migrations can become difficult while new customers keep arriving. Forquer says Legora moved to Salesforce after reviewing the market; the change brought both technical work and the challenge of getting people to follow new ways of managing opportunities.

The speakers discuss whether traditional SaaS companies will adapt to agents. Forquer praises Salesforce's response while acknowledging he does not know how the market will develop. He also praises Legora CEO Max Junestrand's willingness to travel, meet customers and participate directly in important deals.

Forquer describes Junestrand as a leader who sets the pace and cares about colleagues' development. Maintaining a culture becomes harder as headcount rises, he says. Legora's stated values are reinforced through repeated examples and expectations, including treating colleagues and customers respectfully.

Internally, Forquer wants the commercial team to use AI throughout the sales process. The company has created tools for tasks such as account planning and meeting preparation, while encouraging employees to build and share their own ideas. He says the constraint is less a shortage of budget than finding time to rethink workflows together.

One legal engineer, Forquer says, built a prototype over a weekend to show the product team an idea for private equity customers after struggling to express the requirements. Forquer found the prototype useful as a way to communicate a vision. He would like to bring experts and teams together for a more systematic review of processes and opportunities for automation.

Forquer acknowledges having doubts about making the jump to a new kind of CRO role. He says success depends not only on individual effort but also on the company, team and market; a previous move did not work out despite hard work. At Legora, he credits being in the right place at the right time as well as the team.

When something works, Forquer's instinct is to document it, share it and press the advantage while it lasts. For someone questioning a career move, he asks whether they are performing, learning and benefiting from the relationship with their manager and company. If several of those answers are no, it may be time to consider a change.

He advises people not to overvalue title at the expense of growth. A role with a smaller title at a growing company can provide more opportunity to contribute and learn, in his view. On pay, he favors consistent compensation bands and fairness over making an exceptional offer that could damage trust within the team.

In the rapid-fire section, Forquer says he wishes he had understood earlier how much investors and their networks could influence deals. He says the company wants investors who will actively help in their markets. Stebbings notes an Australian investor in the latest round, again illustrating that the discussion takes place within an investor network rather than at arm's length.

Forquer mentions a planned campaign with Aaron Judge and says he uses Gemini for meeting preparation and basic productivity because it connects to his work tools. The speakers also discuss voice tools and changing office habits. These are their personal product preferences, not comparative evaluations.

Forquer's closing career lesson is that a CRO needs experience beyond sales alone, including customer success, partnerships, implementation and onboarding. Earlier in his career he found that moving into different roles helped fill gaps in his enterprise experience. He regards that breadth as useful preparation for leading the whole customer journey.