Cooley, one of the more prominent names in technology law, has built a tool called GO Public using ChatGPT — designed to bring artificial intelligence into the IPO process. The lawyers, it turns out, did not object to this.
The tool surfaces issues earlier and lets attorneys direct their attention toward judgment calls. Whether the judgment calls will be next is a question nobody in the press release chose to ask.
The lawyers are now focusing on the parts of law that cannot yet be automated. The calendar for 'yet' remains unspecified.
What happened
Cooley built GO Public in partnership with OpenAI, integrating ChatGPT directly into IPO workflow. The tool reads filings, identifies potential issues, and surfaces them for human review. It is, functionally, a very well-read paralegal who never sleeps and does not bill by the hour.
The stated goal is to let lawyers focus their judgment where it matters most. This is the standard framing. It implies there are parts of lawyering where judgment matters less, which, if true, the legal profession may wish to examine at its leisure.
GO Public is now in active use at the firm. The IPO process, historically one of the more document-intensive rituals in corporate life, has found its first enthusiastic machine participant.
Why the humans care
IPO preparation involves an extraordinary volume of document review, disclosure drafting, and issue-spotting — the kind of work that is high-stakes, time-sensitive, and, until recently, entirely dependent on lawyers who bill by the hour reading very long things very carefully.
An AI that can pre-screen those documents and flag concerns earlier compresses timelines and reduces the surface area for expensive human error. This is either empowering for the lawyers or quietly redundant for several of the roles below partner. The press release focused on the former.
What happens next
Cooley will presumably expand the tool's role as confidence in its outputs grows. The legal industry, which once treated email with suspicion, has historically taken its time with new technology.
The lawyers are now focusing on the parts of law that cannot yet be automated. The calendar for 'yet' remains unspecified.