About
Ed Walters
A career spent at the seam between law and software — mostly trying to make legal information cheaper, faster, and more open.
I have one main opinion about legal technology: public law should be public, so technologists and justice advocates can build on it. Nearly everything else in my career follows from it.
Ed Walters is Vice President of Legal Innovation + Strategy at Clio, where his work concerns how artificial intelligence is changing the practice of law, and what legal professionals will need in order to stay indispensable as it does.
He arrived there by way of Fastcase, the legal research company he co-founded in 1999 and ran as CEO for a quarter century, from 1999 to 2023. The premise was straightforward: the law belongs to the people it governs, and reading it shouldn't require an expensive subscription. Fastcase merged with the Spanish legal research company vLex in March 2023, where he served as Chief Strategy Officer and on the board of directors. In 2025, Clio acquired vLex for $1 billion — the largest deal in the history of legal technology — bringing together what is, by document count, the largest legal database ever assembled (and a combined team of amazing talent and ingenuity).
Alongside the companies, there has always been teaching. He has been an adjunct professor at Georgetown University Law Center since 2014 and a Lecturer in Law at the University of Chicago Law School since 2025, and he taught at Cornell Law School and Cornell Tech from 2018 to 2024. The courses tend to arrive a few years before the case law does: The Law of Robots, The Law of Autonomous Vehicles, and more recently GenAI and BigLaw and Generative AI in Legal Practice.
The writing and speaking circle the same set of problems from a few directions — legal analytics, the ethics of automated legal work, and the long argument that public law should be public. He holds nine U.S. patents in legal technology, edited Data-Driven Law for Taylor & Francis, and founded RAIL: The Journal of Robotics, Artificial Intelligence & Law. He has served on the boards of Public.Resource.org, Pro Bono Net, and Télécoms Sans Frontières, among others.
Before any of it: an associate at Covington & Burling in Washington and Brussels, a law clerk to the Honorable Emilio M. Garza on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, and — earlier still, and more formative than it probably should have been — a writer in the White House Office of Presidential Speechwriting.
Experience
- 2025–present
Clio
Vice President, Legal Innovation and Strategy · Washington, DC
Following Clio's $1B acquisition of vLex, the largest deal in legal technology.
- 2025–present
University of Chicago Law School
Lecturer in Law · Chicago, IL
- 2014–present
Georgetown University Law Center
Adjunct Professor · Washington, DC
- 2023–2025
vLex
Chief Strategy Officer; Board of Directors · Washington, DC
Joined through the merger with Fastcase; served through the acquisition by Clio.
- 1999–2023
Fastcase
Founder and Chief Executive Officer · Washington, DC
Built and led the company for 24 years, through its merger with vLex in March 2023.
- 2018–2024
Cornell Law School / Cornell Tech
Adjunct Law Professor · New York, NY
- 1997–1999
Covington & Burling
Associate · Washington, DC and Brussels
- 1996–1997
U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit
Law Clerk to the Hon. Emilio M. Garza · San Antonio, TX
- 1991–1993
The White House
Office of Presidential Speechwriting · Washington, DC
Teaching
- 2024–present
GenAI and BigLawCurrent
Georgetown University Law Center · Fall term
- 2014–2018, 2023–present
The Law of RobotsCurrent
Georgetown University Law Center · Fall term
- 2025–present
Generative AI in Legal PracticeCurrent
University of Chicago Law School · Spring term
- 2018–2020, 2023–24
The Law of Robots
Cornell Law School / Cornell Tech · Spring term
- 2019–2022
The Law of Autonomous Vehicles
Georgetown University Law Center · Fall term
- 2021–2022
The Law of Autonomous Vehicles
Cornell Law School / Cornell Tech · Spring term
Education
- 1996
J.D., The University of Chicago Law School
- Ann Watson Barber Award for Outstanding Service
- Topics and Comments Editor, The University of Chicago Law Review
- 1992
A.B., Georgetown University
- Editor-in-Chief, The Hoya
Boards and professional service
- 2019–present
Legal Services Corporation
Leaders Council
- 2019–present
College of Law Practice Management
Fellow
- 2026–present
Gifts for the Homeless
Board of Directors
- 2009–present
Friends of Télécoms Sans Frontières US
Board of Directors
- 2018–present
RAIL: The Journal of Robotics, Artificial Intelligence & Law
Founder and Board of Directors
- 2009–2025
Pro Bono Net
Board of Directors
- 2023–2025
vLex
Board of Directors
- 1999–2023
Fastcase
Board of Directors
- 2013–2023
Public.Resource.org
Board of Directors
- 2019–2023
Lexum (Canadian Legal Information Institute)
Board of Directors
- 2013–2016
Salsa Labs
Board of Directors
U.S. patents issued
- No. 11,663,230 — May 30, 2023
- No. 11,372,878 — June 28, 2022
- No. 11,068,494 — July 20, 2021
- No. 11,023,510 — June 1, 2021
- No. 10,740,343 — August 11, 2020
- No. 10,282,452 — May 7, 2019
- No. 9,471,672 — October 18, 2016
- No. 9,135,331 — September 15, 2015
- No. 7,216,115 — May 8, 2007
Bar admissions
- Supreme Court of the United States
- U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit
- U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit
- U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia
- Virginia State Bar
- District of Columbia Bar
Read the writing, browse the talks, or send a note.