AI startup Superpanel has raised $5.3 million in a seed funding round to automate the legal intake process for law firms. The company, founded by Julien Emery and Dingyu Zhang in 2024, aims to streamline how plaintiff law firms onboard new clients through intelligent automation. For Emery, the mission is deeply personal. As a Canadian, he experienced firsthand the high cost and difficulty of accessing legal services. He also remembers his mother’s car accident and how the legal settlement provided crucial financial stability for his family. These experiences shaped his vision for a more efficient, accessible legal system. “The legal intake process is a maze of forms, phone calls, and dropped leads that often cause people to give up before getting help,” Emery told TechCrunch. “For law firms, it’s a costly, error-prone bottleneck.” Before the rise of advanced AI, automating this complex workflow was considered impractical. But that’s changed. Emery previously worked at Hootsuite and founded Allay, a health insurance underwriting platform that was acquired by Novo Benefits. He teamed up with Zhang, an AI expert, to launch Superpanel with a mission to build a “digital teammate” for legal teams. The platform automates roughly half the work involved in legal intake by collecting client information, guiding users through their case story, and managing document sharing across phone, text, email, and online forums. It categorizes cases by type, jurisdiction, and required documentation, while flagging ambiguous or high-risk situations for human review. “When there’s uncertainty, the system escalates to a real person,” Emery said. “The result is a seamless, multi-channel workflow that feels like working with a trusted employee—reliable, consistent, and scalable.” The seed round was co-led by Outlander VC and Field Ventures, with additional participation from LOI Venture (co-founded by Hootsuite’s founder), Zenda Capital, 8-Bit Capital, and Behind Genius Ventures. Emery noted that many of the investors were introduced through his previous ventures, highlighting strong network-driven support. The funding will be used to accelerate hiring and expand Superpanel’s capabilities, particularly for plaintiff law firms navigating high-volume cases. While Superpanel operates in a competitive space—facing rivals like Clio Grow, LegalClerk.ai, MyCase, and Whippy.ai—Emery believes the company stands out by focusing on continuous, AI-driven client engagement. “Today’s consumers expect instant, self-serve solutions shaped by the digital experiences they use daily,” he said. “Superpanel doesn’t just collect data—it guides clients through every step of their journey, making legal help more accessible and efficient.”