A centralized data repository makes legal investigations quicker and more efficient. It cuts review times and costs while reducing human error. After all, searching for all information in a single location is simple and convenient!

According to Grand View Research, the European eDiscovery market alone is worth $4380 million. It's also growing at 9.3% annually. Asia's eDiscovery industry is growing even faster at 13.7% per year.

Here, we'll discuss how to build a centralized data repository for EMEA legal investigations. Read on for the run-down on centralizing documents and evidence from multiple countries while ensuring regional compliance, secure data access, and cross-border legal readiness. 

What Is a Centralized Repository?

A repository is a centralized digital platform. It's made to store information that might be relevant in legal investigations, including litigation and criminal cases. Information governance software allows information and knowledge to be easily distributed and preserved.

Most companies store their data in many distinct locations, including:

• Microsoft 365
• Google Docs
• Slack
• Teams
• Outlook
• Dropbox
• Clio
• Personal servers and networks
• Custom applications

Creating a centralized repository means preserving the source code in one place. It doesn't remain on personal computers or servers. Additionally, it moves from multiple applications into an all-in-one dashboard.

What Are the Benefits of a Centralized Repository?

Centralized repositories put all a company's data landscape into a single place. This makes it easier to track and analyze information for eDiscovery processes. Easier investigation also makes it easier to eliminate duplicates across systems.

This cuts review times and makes it easier to view data holistically. Everlaw reports that review counts for about 70% of total eDiscovery spending, so cutting these times can save a lot of money.

This happens partly due to a streamlined workflow. As a corporate legal executive or law firm, a Document Management System (DMS) lets you organize files more effectively and access them quickly.

Data integrity in centralized data systems ensures that a legal team can ensure that information is:

• Accurate
• Up-to-date
• Trustworthy
• Verified

This means that you can respond to FOIA requests and subpoenas accurately. Providing the requested information is much easier when you can find it and naturalize it with top data repository strategies.

Streamlining Legal Investigations With an Integrated Dashboard

Companies that use dozens of applications to store data need to pull information into one place to create a centralized repository. This can be challenging without the right tools, but Onna makes it a simple and efficient process.

Our platform uses connectors to pull data from multiple applications that a company or team uses. The connectors integrate data into a single easy-to-access dashboard. You can manage all of your files in one location with a search function that analyzes and identifies data all at once.

Onna also lets companies find value in data that they didn't know existed. During the eDiscovery process, standardizing data is key to managing and assessing it. Onna will help you normalize unstructured data to make it searchable.

Since Onna integrates with cloud computing systems seamlessly, you can process and index data as you go along. You can also pull information from in-house servers and company networks to store alongside this cloud data.

Ultimately, this doesn't just cut review times and make you more efficient. It also helps you reduce legal risks by targeting and capturing the most relevant data. Since Onna stores metadata and embedded links as well as files and documents, it offers a 100% comprehensive audit log that's fully defensible during litigation.

How AI Tools Improve Document Review Platforms

Stanford University reports that AI is currently a $33.9 billion global investment, and it's only growing. EMEA countries are among the most tech-savvy out there, and keeping up with AI is an important part of staying ahead in any industry.

The legal market is no exception, so teams must prioritize AI in eDiscovery!

Onna's AI-powered legal data management technology streamlines operations by automatically identifying and tagging relevant data. It scans the integrated documents in your centralized data repository for keywords and phrases related to your ongoing eDiscovery processes.

Tagging and Normalization

Then, it tags information based on:

• Keywords within content
• Subjects your data is about
• Data source (e.g. Teams or Slack)
• Date that the data was created

At this point, our eDiscovery SaaS technology will:

• Delete duplicates
• Ensure everything is in a readable format
• Eliminate data siloes
• Get rid of outdated information
• Pull embedded text from images, including PNGs and JPEGs
• Transcribe videos and audio files

You'll be able to navigate it more easily at this point, especially because of the robust search features our platform offers.

Analyzing and Reviewing Data With AI eDiscovery Hosting

AI also makes data analysis easier because it enables you to visualize written information more effectively. Once all your data is stored in consistently readable formats, you can generate visual aids like:

• Heatmaps
• Clusters
• Charts
• Graphs

This makes it easier to understand and conceptualize eDiscovery-related information. You can also present these visual aids before a judge during litigation or court proceedings. Doing this will make your case more compelling because you'll have easy-to-interpret visual analytics that build credibility and make a case feel more tangible.

Generative AI capabilities also let Onna's platform summarize long, hard-to-read documents. You can generate these summaries to eliminate complexity and review documents within minutes. The review process becomes faster and more streamlined.

Try Top Information Governance Software in the EMEA

Now that you know how to streamline legal investigations with an AI-powered centralized data repository, it's time to make your eDiscovery processes more efficient.

Onna is committed to offering the best data integration tools available at an affordable price. Our scalable software is fully customizable so that every entity in an eDiscovery process can determine the best way to meet their organization's needs. AI features are constantly updating, so you can rely on the fastest and most up-to-date tools.

We have been recognized by our customers for providing outstanding eDiscovery technology and have obtained several five-star reviews on Google and other platforms. Schedule a customized demo of our services to begin pulling and analyzing data from multiple sources ASAP.