AT&T’s in-house legal department employs hundreds of lawyers and legal professionals worldwide. Before they can advise the business, they must assemble facts, documents, and relevant past work, often drawing on expertise held across different teams. David McAtee, AT&T’s Senior Executive Vice President and General Counsel, says making that expertise easier to access is central to improving how the department works. AT&T is partnering with OpenAI to build what McAtee describes as the “plumbing” that powers a knowledge layer throughout the company, which all legal work can draw upon.

The partnership builds on LegalEdge, AT&T’s team of attorneys, legal professionals, technologists, and project managers focused on applying AI to major legal matters. The next step is to connect more of the company’s accumulated expertise to the work arriving on a lawyer’s desk. Requests come in from across the business, and legal teams need to respond quickly without overlooking risks. Before advising, they must understand the issue, gather relevant context, and decide what needs attention first, making intake a critical part of protecting the business.

Bill Ryan, AT&T’s Chief Compliance Officer, describes one planned initiative as an intake system with “a front door where we have natural language intake.” The system would classify and prioritize requests, connect them with relevant precedent, research, and past work, and give the responsible legal professional historical context and recommended first steps. This would give lawyers a more informed starting point and reduce time spent gathering material needed to assess a matter.

Ryan is most excited about expanding the department’s ability to provide legal judgment at greater scale. McAtee emphasizes that decision-making will always remain with the lawyers. The goal of the partnership is to put better information within reach so lawyers can spend more time applying their expertise.