The legal AI conversation tends to center on the courtroom: who drafts briefs faster, whether LLMs can pass the Bar, what BigLaw does next. However, the more consequential action is actually happening elsewhere.

In a new piece for Insurance Thought Leadership, Dan Ivtsan, Steno Senior Director of AI Products, traces how carriers have been running algorithmic case valuation for thirty years, and how the leap from rules-based tools like Colossus to LLM-driven analysis is compressing the information asymmetry that has long defined litigation leverage.

The piece opens with a number that puts the stakes in context. McKinsey estimates generative AI could unlock $50–70 billion in insurance industry revenue. But the more important figure may be this one: 78% of P&C insurers are already using generative AI, and only 4% have scaled it meaningfully. The arms race is underway, but most litigators haven't noticed the battlefield has moved.

Dan explains what that shift actually looks like in practice:

LLMs are the leap. They don't need structured fields. They ingest the entire case file, medical records, deposition transcripts, and police reports, and spot nuance a rules engine never could. The gap between what a carrier knows about a case and what a plaintiff's attorney knows has always been a matter of leverage. That gap is narrowing fast.

The plaintiff bar isn't standing still. EvenUp, now valued at over $2 billion, has crowdsourced actual settlement data from more than 2,000 plaintiff firms. A startup called Mighty launched earlier this year with an AI agent that negotiates personal injury settlements directly against carrier AI on behalf of consumers. The data moat carriers have built over decades is eroding, and both sides are now racing to replace it with proprietary models.

What happens when those models disagree? Dan puts the question plainly: does a shared analytical baseline strip away posturing and accelerate resolution, or does it entrench positions because each side treats its own model as truth? The regulatory landscape is already responding. At least 25 states plus D.C. have adopted governance requirements for AI in claims handling, and Colorado has gone further with mandatory bias testing and civil penalties.

Read the full piece in Insurance Thought Leadership.