For the first time in the history of commerce, contracts are being completely digitized. This development has major implications for every industry—even professional football.
Consider the recent report from ESPN that veteran NFL quarterback Josh McCown signed a new contract with the New York Jets while sitting at a Chick-fil-A drive thru. A photo of the transaction shows McCown using his smartphone to finalize the $10 million, 1-year deal.
— Josh McCown (@JoshMcCown12) March 14, 2018
The most obvious benefit of digitized contracts is convenience—in McCown's case the ability to finalize a deal on his phone while waiting for his order. But really, this is just the beginning.
By digitizing contracts, we can now apply the power of computer science and emerging technologies like artificial intelligence (AI) to contracts in order to extract new value from what have been largely static documents.
Contracts form the foundation of commerce, governing every dollar in and out of an organization. But due to contracts' inherently unstructured nature, it has been difficult to treat them as the strategic assets they really are.
Now, contract lifecycle management (CLM) software is enabling companies to proactively monitor contractual obligations to ensure compliance while providing a single source of truth for any contract anywhere in the world. CLM software allows organizations to use automated processes to identify, assess and mitigate risk while also increasing contract velocity for any type of contract.
And contract management solutions enable you to execute contracts electronically—easily and securely—from anywhere.
With the application of AI, these capabilities are being enhanced even further. AI applications can aid organizations in contract negotiations by using past contract performance to identify language that should or shouldn't be included in new contracts; speed the import of legacy contracts with machine learning that can identify and categorize contract clauses; and automatically surface, create and manage obligations within a contract.
Taken together these capabilities can have truly transformative impact by increasing business velocity, protecting against missed obligations and other risks, and maximizing contract performance.
Signing $10 million contracts while at a fast food restaurant is great example of how the digitization of contracts is impacting behavior—and points to the larger transformation happening in the contract management space. To learn more, contact Icertis today.