MOLTON, Provider of Legal BPaaS 'Cloud Legal,' and NX Wanbishi Archives, Provider of E-Contract Service 'WAN-Sign,' Co-author Verification Article on Contract Review and Drafting with Generative and Legal AI

MOLTON Co., Ltd. (formerly a23s Co., Ltd.) (Location: Chuo-ku, Tokyo; CEO, Attorney at Law [Japan & NY State]: Yasufumi Sakiji; hereinafter MOLTON), a domestic pioneer in contract and legal BPaaS and an Alternative Legal Service Provider (ALSP) offering the legal AI + BPO service 'Cloud Legal,' and NX Wanbishi Archives Co., Ltd. (Location: Minato-ku, Tokyo; President: Yutaka Takahashi; hereinafter NX Wanbishi Archives), a group company of NIPPON EXPRESS HOLDINGS, INC. that provides the e-contract and contract management service 'WAN-Sign' with AI contract management functions via BPaaS, have jointly created a unique article on the utilization and verification of AI for contract drafting and review, which are critical tasks for companies and institutions. With supervision from legal tech strategy officers and lawyers, the article explains both the risks and benefits of AI by disclosing everything from market trends to specific verification results.

[ Background of the Article's Publication ]

Recently, with the advent of general-purpose generative AI and AI agents like ChatGPT, Gemini, and Claude, AI is expected to be a game-changer for operational efficiency across all industries. In the legal domain, which is central to corporate operations, general-purpose generative AI such as 'Claude for Legal' and 'Microsoft 365 Copilot: Legal Agent for Word' are being enhanced as AI agents for law firms and legal tasks. There is significant attention on the potential of AI in contract work, especially in 'contract drafting' and 'contract review,' which require specialized knowledge and have many checkpoints.

In the highly specialized and accuracy-demanding field of law and legal work, many companies and institutions may wonder, 'Can general-purpose generative AI be directly implemented in practice?'

Concerns regarding AI use in legal and contract work include:

Ensuring Accuracy: Will AI hallucinations (plausible-sounding falsehoods) lead to incorrect legal interpretations or the creation of legal documents and contract reviews based on non-existent laws?
Contextual Understanding: To what extent can AI understand a company's unique business model, the power dynamics with counterparties, the context of past negotiations, and propose appropriate revisions?
Compliance with Japanese Domestic Law: Does the AI understand and provide answers based on Japan-specific laws, regulations, guidelines, and industry/business culture?
Liability: Who is responsible for the content of answers and documents created using AI?
Security: Concerns about privacy protection, the Personal Information Protection Act, and information leakage risks when inputting contract data containing employment information, personal data, undisclosed new business plans, or confidential information into general-purpose AI.

To address these legal and industry-specific challenges, the adoption of 'Legal AI' (law-specialized AI) and 'Legal Tech' from domestic vendors, which are specifically trained on Japanese legal data and Japanese contract templates and optimized for domestic law and legal practice, is advancing.

This joint article, based on real-world challenges, conducts a comparative verification of actual contract drafting and review using both 'general-purpose generative AI' and 'Legal AI.' It highlights the differences in output accuracy, risk detection capabilities, and their respective strengths and weaknesses in practice, questioning whether AI can be an 'immediate asset' in legal affairs. By co-authoring and publishing this verification article on 'practical AI utilization methods,' we aim to support the resolution of societal issues like the shortage of legal professionals, and contribute to the sound operation and competitiveness of companies.

Going forward, both companies will promote collaboration in legal DX, corporate DX, and AI-driven data utilization to strengthen the legal and compliance frameworks of companies and institutions and to streamline contract operations.

[ Verification Article Information ]

Can AI Draft and Review Contracts? Possible Tasks, Merits, and Caveats
https://wan-sign.wanbishi.co.jp/blog/contract-ai

[ Information on Article Authors and Supervisors ]

Supervisor
Yasufumi Sakiji, CEO, MOLTON Co., Ltd.
-Profile-
Attorney at Law (Daini Tokyo Bar Association) & New York State Attorney
Representative Attorney at Nayuta Law (https://www.nayuta-law.com/)
Specially Appointed Professor, Tokyo University of Pharmacy and Life Sciences
Project Lecturer, Open Innovation Promotion Headquarters, Keio University
Graduated from the University of Tokyo, Faculty of Engineering. Worked as a lawyer at Anderson Mori & Tomotsune on venture investment, M&A, contract negotiations for intellectual property rights, patent litigation, and cross-border corporate legal affairs. After studying at the University of California Berkeley Law School (UC Berkeley LL.M.), he was selected for the mentoring team/IP mentor of the Intellectual Property Acceleration Program (IPAS) provided by the Japan Patent Office and INPIT. He served as an executive officer, product manager, and in-house counsel at an AI medical device startup, and co-founder/COO of a Keio University-originated healthcare startup, before becoming the CEO of MOLTON Co., Ltd. (formerly a23s Co., Ltd.), which develops and provides the virtual law firm 'Cloud Legal,' an ALSP with legal AI. Author of 'Intellectual Property Due Diligence in M&A and Venture Investment.'

Author/Supervisor
Yoshiki Kanazawa, CSMO (Chief Sales & Marketing Officer), MOLTON Co., Ltd.
-Profile-
From Kanagawa Prefecture. Strategic Sales Advisor at MOLTON Co., Ltd. (formerly a23s Co., Ltd.) from September 2024 to September 2025. At an IBM-affiliated ISV and a trading house SIer, he engaged in solution sales, partner sales, alliance strategy, and product planning in areas such as mainframes, cloud (IaaS/PaaS/SaaS), SI services, e-Document Act, Electronic Books Preservation Act, form creation/management platforms, core printing solutions, development support platforms, J-SOX Act, and IT general/application controls. He was also active in the legal tech field as a distributor for e-contract services and CLM. He later joined an e-contract manufacturer in 2017, when it was still small, in the e-contract promotion office (now the e-contract business division), which covers SaaS, electronic certification, and legal tech. He has been involved in the e-contract, CLM, and legal tech business since its early days, before the government's 2020 cabinet decision to promote the move away from physical seals and paper.

●CSMO Appointment Release: https://prtimes.jp/main/html/rd/p/000000027.000126939.html

MOLTON has strengthened its structure of legal AI, lawyers, specialists, and legal BPO by appointing AI-savvy lawyers as AI advisors, who are also official ambassadors of Japan's largest generative AI community, #SOZO Village (operated by Kaiba Inc.), and by acquiring (rolling up) the IP/Legal/Risk/Governance consulting team from a mid-sized consulting firm of a listed corporate group.

●...[and other links]

[ MOLTON and NX Wanbishi Archives Initiatives ]

●'Cloud Legal' and NX Wanbishi Archives' document digitization services 'WAN-Scan' and 'AI-OCR×BPO' collaborate in the legal due diligence field.
●NX Group's 'WAN-Sign' and virtual lawyer consultation service 'Cloud Legal' form a business matching agreement for sales collaboration.
●'Cloud Legal' releases a digital government plan for government offices, local governments, and municipal DX.
●'WAN-Sign' and 'Cloud Legal' collaboration page.

[ Cloud Legal Event Information ]

Sponsored and speaking at the Sankei Shimbun event: 'A Thorough Comparison of 'Legal Tech' in the AI Era 2026: Legal DX for 'Focusing on Core Tasks' and 'AI Governance'?' on June 9, 2026 (Tue).

This event seminar will thoroughly explain the latest trends in legal DX and legal tech, which are becoming more autonomous with AI agents. It will systematically compare and analyze major legal tech like AI contract review and CLM, and present strategic shifts towards high-value-added 'offensive legal' work, as well as concrete measures for pressing issues like AI governance.

The keynote speaker will be Mr. Takayuki Matsuo, a graduate of the University of Tokyo Faculty of Law and Harvard Law School (LL.M.), among others. He is a Partner Attorney at Momo-o, Matsuo & Namba, a New York State Attorney, Representative Director of the AI Legal Tech Association, and holds various academic positions. He has authored numerous books on generative AI, legal practice, and IT/AI law, and will discuss common challenges and solutions for companies adopting legal tech and current legal DX.

Details: https://sankei.smktg.jp/public/seminar/view/5578

[ Reference Information ]

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