20 F A L L 2 0 1 5 C A N A D I A N L a w y e r 4 S T U D E N T S
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Blue J Legal
Former JD/MBA student Ramin Wright.
ROSS
In the photo (le to right): Akash Venkat,
Shuai Wang, Jimoh Ovbiagele, and Andrew
Arruda. Missing is team member Pargles
Dall'Oglio.
StandIn Law
Andrew Johnston, LLM student at
Osgoode Hall Law School.
New Court Challenges Program
Joshua D'Cunha, S.M. Karim,
Zoma Ogbonna, and Malik Suliman.
LEGAL
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innovators
Blue J Legal
The innovation: Blue J Legal is "kind of like a super-charged Siri for tax law," says
University of Toronto law professor Benjamin Alarie. Like ROSS, Blue J Legal is a program
that uses artifi cial intelligence. It helps determine whether a person is an employee or an
independent contractor, a question that has important implications for tax law but also in
areas such as labour, contract, and tort matters.
The minds: Former JD/MBA student Ramin Wright is assisting U of T law professors
Alarie, Anthony Niblett, and Albert Yoon in developing and training Blue J Legal.
The inspiration: "Tax is very, very complicated," Alarie says. " ere's clearly a role
here for using artifi cial research in assisting with legal tax research."
Potential users: Blue J Legal is not just for lawyers. Once it's in the market, the
developers believe accountants will use it, too. It is not, however, something consumers will
turn to at tax fi ling time.
What's next: Blue J Legal has incorporated and is looking to join a campus
accelerator for startups. e team will continue to work at developing it with the goal of
launching by the end of 2016.
