Building a Fully Automated eDiscovery Process at Tokio Marine HCC
Industry: Specialty Insurance
Founded: 1974
Employees: c. 4,400
Headquarters: Houston, TX
Challenge
- On-premises eDiscovery infrastructure
- Manual legal hold process
Solution
- Unified, cloud-based Exterro eDiscovery suite
- Fixed-price model offering predictable budget
Results
- Automated legal holds issued in minutes
- Significant cost savings through in-house review
Tokio Marine HCC is a leading specialty insurance group founded in 1974 and headquartered in Houston, Texas. The company has a workforce of approximately 4,400 employees, underwriting more than 100 specialty insurance products across over 180 counties and territories. As is the case for any large-scale insurance organization, the legal department serves as the engine room of risk management.
By 2021, given the company's global reach and diverse product lines, the eDiscovery team at Tokio Marine HCC (TMHCC) looked to evolve its litigation support framework to ensure its infrastructure aligned with the demands of the digital corporate landscape. The team sought a solution that would make managing legal hold compliance simpler, faster, and more transparent, backed by automated tracking and robust reporting to seamlessly handle their growing caseload.
Evolving Infrastructure for Modern Litigation
To effectively support its expanding enterprise needs, TMHCC identified opportunities to modernize its legal hold and data management workflows, migrating away from manual processes. While the team had successfully used an established on-premises AccessData application for core data collection and processing, they required more advanced, automated notification and tracking capabilities to match the speed of modern corporate litigation.
"We recognized the opportunity to elevate our operations by upgrading to a modern, cloud-based solution," explains Nick Curtis, eDiscovery Manager at TMHCC. "Our objective was to update our technology investment and internal procedural guidelines to align with a cloud-centric workflow that could most effectively support our current and future litigation support requirements."
Managing several complex matters at any given time meant that tracking acknowledgments, recording responses, and maintaining a defensible audit trail required significant and oftentimes manual administrative coordination. Additionally, managing the on-premises architecture placed the burden of server management and database maintenance directly on the team as matters advanced through the eDiscovery process. To optimize efficiency and ensure they could meet project timelines, the legal department wanted a solution where they could manage as much of the eDiscovery process as possible: a streamlined, unified environment that would grant them greater operational autonomy and direct control over their workflows.
Seeking a Unified Path to the Cloud
When TMHCC began the search for a new partner, the goal was clear: consolidation and modernization. The team did not want a piecemeal approach of using different vendors for different stages of the Electronic Discovery Reference Model (EDRM); they wanted a platform that could handle the full eDiscovery process, from identification and preservation through collection, review, and production.
As TMHCC was already familiar with AccessData (which had been acquired by Exterro), Exterro became a natural frontrunner. However, the decision was not just about continuity; it was about the breadth of the offering. During the evaluation process, the team analyzed various vendors, comparing strengths, costs, and pricing models.
"We were looking for the ability to issue and manage legal holds, process, collect, and review data," says Nick. "We wanted something that could cover those five major components—legal hold, collection, processing, review, and production. We wanted to streamline that entire process with one vendor and one single software package."
One of the deciding factors was Exterro’s fixed-price model. In a corporate environment where legal budgets must be predictable, the usage-based pricing models offered by other vendors made it difficult to forecast costs. Exterro’s model provided the transparency the company required.
The Solution: A Comprehensive eDiscovery Ecosystem
The implementation, which began in earnest in 2022, saw TMHCC transition to a full suite of Exterro products. The solution set was designed to handle the heavy lifting across a large volume of open matters, many of which are now managed entirely within the Exterro environment.
- Exterro Legal Hold: Automating the issuance, tracking, and reporting of legal holds.
- eDiscovery Data Management: Managing data discovery and movement across the enterprise.
- Employee Change Monitor: Tracking employee status changes via HR mapping.
- Data Source Discovery: Identifying network shares, M365 applications, and Teams data.
- Review & Production: Conducting in-house document review for smaller matters.
The implementation was not just about software; it was about a cultural shift in how the team worked. Nick, drawing on his extensive eDiscovery experience, updated and enhanced existing policies and procedures to align with the new technology. By creating extensive manuals and recording training sessions, the team became self-sufficient.
The Results: Automation, Autonomy, and ROI
The move to Exterro has transformed the TMHCC corporate legal department into a proactive, left-side EDRM powerhouse. By focusing on information governance, identification, and preservation, the team has gained unprecedented control over their data before eDiscovery even starts.
Speed and Efficiency
The manual legal hold process that once took significant manual effort and coordination has been reduced to a few clicks.
"Just having the ability to go in and create a legal hold—it becomes a simpler process because the templates are there," Nick notes. "It’s all automated. We can just send out a legal hold quickly, in minutes essentially, and then preserve Microsoft 365 data easily. Since we’re managing the hold, it makes sense to have the access and permissions to set or release those preservations ourselves."
Strategic Data Discovery
Using Exterro Data Source Discovery, the team can now pinpoint exactly where relevant data lives—whether it is in a specific OneDrive, a Teams site, or a network file share—through integration with Active Directory. The Employee Change Monitor (ECM) ensures that if a custodian leaves the company or changes roles, the legal team knows right away and can take appropriate steps to prevent data loss.
Significant Cost Savings
Perhaps the most impactful outcome has been the streamlined management of matters within Exterro, from legal hold and preservation through production. While the team had already been handling smaller matters internally, the platform has made those workflows more efficient, centralized, and scalable.
The company is fully aware of the cost savings and the benefits of doing the smaller reviews in-house and how much that saves us money," says Nick. "For larger matters, we still work with outside counsel, but for a significant number of matters, it makes sense to do it ourselves."]
Tokio Marine has realized significant cost efficiencies using the Exterro platform, including its early case assessment capabilities, by reducing expenses associated with ESI collection and processing, document review, production, hosting, and project management across a corpus of more than 680 GB of data.
A Collaborative Partnership
Beyond the technology, TMHCC values the human element of their partnership with Exterro. The relationship with their Customer Success Manager (CSM) and the support team has been a cornerstone of their success.
"I would definitely recommend Exterro because it does a good job covering the full range of products, so it's a seamless transition between phases," Nick concludes. "But the key is having a good relationship with the vendor. We benefit a lot by working with our customer success representative and account manager. We know that support will work to help us with any issue we might run into."
By moving to the cloud and unifying their eDiscovery workflow under Exterro, Tokio Marine HCC has not only modernized its legal operations but also turned the legal department into a model of efficiency. With a large volume of matters currently active, the team is now equipped to handle the complexities of specialty insurance litigation with speed, defensibility, and a clear eye on the bottom line.
Ready to achieve the same efficiency and cost savings as Tokio Marine HCC? See how the unified, cloud-based Exterro eDiscovery suite can automate manual processes, saving you time and money.
