In conversation with Claudia Linares, Founder at Fortalea Advisory and Fortalea Law
“Jus AI doesn’t just save me time. It gives me the confidence to move faster without cutting corners.”
Results at a Glance
| Outcome | Result |
| Research time | Full-day research tasks now completed in 2 to 3 hours on active cases |
| Research confidence | Moves faster with certainty, eliminating the risk of missing critical material in high-stakes matters |
| Argument quality | ICC DRL®, Oxford University Press publications, and global awards database accessible in one platform, without context switching |
| Arbitrator intelligence | Detailed arbitrator profiling and conflict checking via Jus Connect, integrated into case strategy |
| Client and funder advice | Higher quality research translates directly into more reliable case assessments and funding recommendations for capital deployment. |
About the Firm
Fortalea is two sister entities. Fortalea Advisory offers litigation finance advisory, asset recovery strategy, and legal asset monetization, helping clients and funders assess whether a dispute is worth pursuing, structure the financing around it, and ensure a favorable outcome actually translates into recovered value. Fortalea Law handles international arbitration, cross-border litigation, and global enforcement campaigns. Together, they help clients and funders not just win cases, but actually get paid.
Both were founded by Claudia Linares, individually ranked Band 1 in Litigation Funding: International Arbitration (Global-wide) by Chambers & Partners, and formerly Global Head of International Arbitration and Litigation at Parabellum Capital, one of the world’s leading litigation funders. Over 15 years across law firms, government, and eight years on the capital side of litigation finance, she assessed hundreds of cases and decided which disputes were worth financing before bringing that perspective back into practice. The conviction behind Fortalea is simple: legal strategy and financial expertise belong together. The firm thinks about disputes the way funders and enforcement specialists do and it is precisely that integrated perspective that clients come to Fortalea for.
Fortalea Advisory brings a discipline that is rare in legal practice: the ability to evaluate a dispute the way a capital allocator would. That means assessing not just whether a claim is legally strong, but whether it is financially viable, and how to convert it into recoverable value.
Where most boutiques choose between arbitration depth and commercial acumen, Fortalea Law and Fortalea Advisory offer both. And it is that ambition — to deliver rigorous legal analysis alongside sophisticated financial strategy — that made the choice of research tools a matter of strategic importance from day one.
The Opportunity
Operational Challenge
Claudia has assessed hundreds of cases over the course of her career. The process she describes is a demanding one: stepping into the shoes of an arbitrator, thinking as a tribunal would, identifying what precedents move the needle, and locating the weaknesses in a claim before they surface at the worst moment.
That kind of analysis requires research that is not merely fast, but complete.
“Before Jus AI, research for me was slow and very fragmented. I would spend hours across databases and still walk away not knowing whether I had missed something…In high-stakes arbitration, that uncertainty is expensive. For you and for the client.”
Strategic Challenge
Fortalea’s model adds a further layer of complexity. When advising a client on whether a dispute is worth pursuing, or helping a funder assess the merits of a case before committing capital, the quality of the research is not just a matter of professional standards. It is the foundation of the advice itself.
A missed precedent, an overlooked award, a gap in doctrinal analysis: any of these can distort a case assessment in ways that carry real financial consequences. The challenge, therefore, was not simply finding a faster tool. It was finding one built to the standard the work demands.
In litigation finance, a flawed case assessment does not just affect one client, it affects whether capital gets deployed, and whether it gets returned. The research standard, therefore, has to meet both a legal and a financial bar.
The Solution
Claudia evaluated AI tools with a specific and non-negotiable requirement: depth. A generic AI with surface-level knowledge of arbitration was not an option.
“I didn’t want a generic AI that happened to know some arbitration. I wanted a tool that was built specifically for this field, with the source quality to back up the responses.”
That clarity of requirement led to Jus AI.
“Jus AI is the only platform where the depth of the database and the intelligence of the search actually match the complexity of the work.”
Several features confirmed the decision and continue to define how the firm operates:
- The publications library: Described by Claudia as what “separates Jus AI from every other tool I’ve used,” giving immediate access to leading doctrinal sources without switching platforms
- ICC DRL® and OUP integration: Both integrated into a single platform, enabling the doctrinal layer that argument construction demands, without context switching
- Document upload and hearing analysis: The ability to upload hearing transcripts and use Jus AI to analyse tribunal questions, identify outstanding issues, and inform post-hearing briefs
- Jus Connect for arbitrator intelligence: Enabling detailed arbitrator profiling, research into each candidate’s position on specific legal issues, and conflict checking through the integrated conflict checker
The Impact
Research Time: From a Full Day to Two-Three Hours
The most immediate and measurable impact is time. What once required a full working day now takes two to three hours.
“Research that used to take a full day now takes two to three hours on an active case. That’s real capacity. And for a boutique where every hour is billable or strategic, that’s a competitive edge.”
For a practice where time is either revenue or strategic investment, that difference is not incremental, it is structural.
Moving Faster Without Compromising Standards
Speed alone would mean little if it came at the cost of thoroughness. What Claudia describes is something more significant: the ability to accelerate without accepting any trade-off in quality or completeness.
“Jus AI doesn’t just save me time. It gives me the confidence to move faster without cutting corners. That allows Fortalea to deliver big firm quality with boutique responsiveness.”
That confidence changes the character of the work. It enables Fortalea to be more responsive to clients, more decisive in strategy, and more thorough in analysis, simultaneously, rather than having to choose between them.
Building Bulletproof Arguments in One Place
One of the persistent inefficiencies of legal research is fragmentation. Building a strong argument has traditionally meant moving between databases, journals, award repositories, and institutional resources, each requiring separate access, separate searches, and separate synthesis.
Jus AI resolves that.
“The publications library is what separates Jus AI from every other tool I’ve used. When I’m in the middle of analysing an argument or a position, I need that doctrinal layer, not just the award. ICC DRL® and OUP integrated into the same platform means I’m not context switching. Everything I need to build a bulletproof argument is in one place.”
The result is not just faster research. It is more complete research, with fewer points of failure between a question and a reliable answer.
Arbitration Strategy from Every Angle
Jus AI is embedded across the full arc of Fortalea’s case work. Claudia describes using it after a recent hearing to upload transcripts, analyse how the proceeding went, review the tribunal’s questions, identify outstanding issues, and build the post-hearing brief from that analysis.
“Jus AI is great for arbitration strategy. I used it recently, after a hearing, uploading the hearing transcripts to analyse how the hearing went, to review the tribunal’s questions, to answer all of those questions in the post-hearing briefs, and to understand where the claimant’s position is. Then I used that analysis to actually draft the post-hearing briefs.”
On arbitrator selection, Jus Connect and Jus AI work in combination: profiles surface through Jus Connect, while Jus AI enables deeper research into each candidate’s position on specific legal issues, supported by the integrated conflict checker.
Advice That Clients and Funders Can Actually Rely On
For Fortalea Advisory, where the quality of case assessment directly shapes funding decisions, the standard of research is critical.
“When I am advising a client on whether a dispute is worth fighting, or helping a funder assess the merits of a case, the quality of my research directly affects the quality of that advice. Jus AI is part of how I deliver analysis that clients and funders can actually rely on.”
In litigation finance, an inaccurate case assessment has consequences that extend well beyond the courtroom. The confidence Jus AI provides is, in that context, a professional obligation as much as a commercial advantage.
Size Is No Longer the Advantage
What Jus AI has made possible is exactly what Claudia set out to build: a practice where the quality of the research matches the ambition of the model.
“Where strength meets strategy, that’s Fortalea. And you can’t have either without the right tools. Jus AI is one of them.”
Ready to see how Jus AI can transform your arbitration practice?
Book a personalized demo today and experience the speed, accuracy, and confidence that leading firms like Three Crowns rely on.
