Faculti Lawyers has been named Australia's most innovative professional services company, taking gold in the Professional Services category of the 2026 Financial Review BOSS Most Innovative Companies Awards.
The award recognises Faculti's development of Fai, its proprietary artificial intelligence platform that is transforming how legal services are delivered to major corporate and institutional clients.
Developed in-house and launched in May 2026, Fai combines AI technology with legal expertise to deliver complex legal work faster, more efficiently and at scale.
Unlike many law firms that rely on third-party AI software, Faculti has built its own platform, giving it greater control over how the technology is developed, deployed and adapted to meet clients' changing needs.
Faculti Executive Chairman Adrian Tembel said the award recognised the firm's commitment to making innovation deliver practical benefits for clients.
"At Faculti, we haven't simply introduced AI into existing processes. We've built our own technology around the needs of our clients, combining the expertise of our lawyers with the speed, efficiency and scalability of AI," Adrian said.
Fai delivering real results for clients
Developed under the leadership of Faculti Chief Innovation Officer Ben Lehman, Fai is designed to work alongside legally trained professionals, supporting tasks including legal research, document drafting, data processing and workflow management.
The platform can be customised to accommodate the specific processes, reporting requirements and operational needs of individual clients, allowing Faculti to respond quickly as those requirements evolve.
Fai is already delivering measurable benefits. Its implementation has helped one client achieve savings of more than $500,000, while reducing the time required to manage a major national leasing portfolio by 75 per cent.
The technology is now used by approximately 1,000 lawyers across Faculti and sister firm Thomsons, with around 80 per cent of staff across the two firms having used the platform.
Ben said developing Fai in-house had enabled Faculti to move quickly from innovation to practical results.
"The real value of AI isn't simply what the technology can do. It's how effectively you can apply it to solve the problems that matter to clients," Mr Lehman said.
"By building Fai ourselves, we can continually refine and adapt the platform to meet specific client needs, without being constrained by the development priorities of external software providers."
Learn more about Fai.
The AFR BOSS Most Innovative Companies Awards recognise Australian and New Zealand organisations demonstrating outstanding innovation across a range of industries.
Read more about Faculti's award win here.
Photo credit: Paper Cranes, 2026 Australian Financial Review BOSS Most Innovative Companies Awards