Blue Pencil Box, a law-focused tech startup out of Raleigh, has been acquired by Atlanta firm Fisher Phillips.
The deal – financial terms were not disclosed – comes amid some industry turmoil, as venture capitalists have said a “day of reckoning” is coming for startups in need of financing.
Attorney Jonathan Crook founded Blue Pencil Box in Raleigh two years ago. He said his startup was doing well and in wasn't seeking out a buyer last summer when he began informally batting around ideas with Bob Yonowitz, a partner at Fisher Phillips, an international labor and employment law firm with more than 600 attorneys in offices across the country.
“At one point it occurred to me, hey, wouldn’t it be cool if we teamed up on this together?” he said. “It was definitely not something I necessarily set out to do.”
Crook said Fisher Phillips was initially a customer of Blue Pencil Box, which he started in 2022.
After practicing law in Raleigh and seeing “a need for a comprehensive resource that would essentially distill this very complex legal area into manageable and understandable pieces and tools,” Crook took the leap to entrepreneurship with Blue Pencil Box.
Crook wanted to create an easy-to-use tool that would also stay up to date as the law changes. But he was an attorney, not a coder. So he used a no-code automation platform, tinkering until his idea became a reality.
“I was able to program these bots that automatically allow users to create their own checklists and surveys based on the content I created and was keeping up to date each day,” Crook said.
While he employed contractors from time to time, he was the firm’s sole employee. He was also its only investor, bootstrapping the company, and benefiting from the exit.
Crook will return to practicing law, joining Fisher Phillips’ Employee Defections and Trade Secrets team as a partner. Crook will remain in Raleigh but he’ll technically be associated with Fisher Phillips’ Charlotte office.
“I could not be more excited to join one of the most innovative law firms in the country and help our clients navigate the increasingly complex world of non-competes and restrictive covenants,” he said on LinkedIn.
Fisher Phillips, in its own post, said Blue Pencil Box would fall under its fpSolutions and would provide solutions assisting companies in drafting, administering and analyzing non-compete agreements and other restrictive covenants.
Crook founded Blue Pencil Box in August of 2022 after working at law firms Jackson Lewis and Young Moore and Henderson.
It’s one example of a local startup working to make complex law more accessible. Another, Courtroom5, is based in Durham and designed to help non-lawyers boost their odds in foreclosure, medical debt and other complex cases.
Blue Pencil Box is one of the first exits in the region in 2024. NeedsList, a Durham tech firm that aims to match crisis-response organizations with critical resources, last month announced it's being acquired by technology firm Armillaria.