Where did law firms spend their technology dollars in 2013? Every year, the International Legal Technology Association (ILTA) and the market research and consulting firm InsideLegal team up to conduct a survey examining the technology purchasing trends and budgets of ILTA firm members. That’s old news, insofar as the 2013 survey was published last August at the time of ILTA’s annual conference.

However, on its blog, InsideLegal has just revisited the survey and created a graphic that gives an at-a-glance overview of 2013 technology purchases broken down by firm size. The blog says it will also publish one looking ahead to 2014. It is an interesting look at law firm tech spending.

insidelegalspending

Click to see full graphic (PDF)

Not surprisingly, the biggest spending categories overall were for computers, with firms overall spending the most on desktop hardware, followed by laptops and notebooks. These appear to be the categories where smaller firms made their biggest investments.

In terms of overall spending across firms of all sizes, two other significant categories were storage area networks and network upgrades, suggesting a consistent pattern of investment in infrastructure.

At the small-firm end of the spectrum (firms of 1-24 lawyers), other sizable areas of spending reflect the nuts-and-bolts of running a smaller firm: wireless networks, printers and multi-function devices, scanners, dictation systems, and antivirus software.

Among the largest firms, of 400 or more lawyers, other major areas of spending included network security, video conferencing, VoIP telephone systems, and server-based virtualization.

Check out the full post and graphic at InsideLegal’s blog.

Photo of Bob Ambrogi Bob Ambrogi

Bob is a lawyer, veteran legal journalist, and award-winning blogger and podcaster. In 2011, he was named to the inaugural Fastcase 50, honoring “the law’s smartest, most courageous innovators, techies, visionaries and leaders.” Earlier in his career, he was editor-in-chief of several legal publications, including The National Law Journal, and editorial director of ALM’s Litigation Services Division.