My initial meeting with Justin McCallon was unbelievable. It started – and ended – in the product demo. I couldn’t stop thinking how transformative the experience was and how the product gave off this sense of ‘magic.’ Callidus was easily the most advanced technology I had seen developed within 18 months of inception as I watched more than 40,000 documents get processed in thirty minutes and create a fact based timeline of events highlighting discrepancies and case law to support and suggest claims to make.
Callidus creates a generational leap in how legal services are delivered – faster, smarter, and with far greater precision. By reengineering litigation workflows from the ground up, Callidus doesn’t just boost efficiency – it expands access and improves the quality of legal arguments. Lawyers spend more time practicing law and less time bogged down by the mundane, yet crucial tasks needed to build, present, and manage a case.
Market Context & Timing
Generative AI is transforming nearly every sector, but the $400 billion legal services industry still lags behind. Litigation remains slow, expensive, and manual with the discovery process alone often accounting for more than half the cost of a case. Lawyers spend countless hours on repetitive tasks – especially research and review – that take time away from actual strategy.
For smaller firms without large support teams, the pressure is even more acute. They’re expected to deliver faster, more thorough work with fewer resources. That’s where Callidus comes in.
How Callidus Fixes the Problem
Callidus provides an operating system for litigators and unlike chatbots that offer shallow answers, Callidus delivers real legal work: exhaustive precedent research, structured legal outlines, and fully drafted, citation-rich documents, fact checked by multiple agents while requiring a ‘lawyer-in-the-loop’ to sign off. What once took a week now takes 10 minutes while integrating directly into the lawyers workflow, enhancing—not replacing—their strategic role.
The Founding Team and Why We Invested
From the very first conversation, Callidus founder and CEO Justin McCallon stood out. A former corporate attorney, Justin knows the inefficiencies of litigation firsthand. His clarity of vision – and detailed plan to address the inefficiencies – was as compelling as the product demo.
He could dive into the legal and technical weeds, then explain it clearly enough for my grandma to understand. His mix of depth, clarity, and urgency is rare.
At Cervin, we look for founders looking for true partners – founders who move fast, think clearly, and execute precisely. Justin fits that mold. He’s intense, focused, and all in.
Callidus checks all of the boxes for Cervin's investment thesis:
- Unique Technology & Defensible Moat: A proprietary database of 10+ million U.S. legal cases, enriched with metadata, summaries, and tags. Its visual and “agentic AI” architecture layers multiple AI models and deep engineering to drive accuracy and reduce hallucinations.
- Underserved Market: By focusing on small firms and solo practitioners – which represents a majority of the attorneys in the market – Callidus is addressing a large market and giving them the opportunity to move upmarket with their services.
- Strong Early Traction: Callidus has grown from zero to $2 million ARR in a year and a half, fueled mostly by an efficient “prosumer” motion and great organic traction.
- Founder-Led Execution, Aligned with Cervin’s Values: Efficiency, speed, and capital discipline are all baked into this company’s DNA and reflected in its data driven approach.
What’s Next
Today, Callidus already works with over 1,000 attorneys and this funding will accelerate Callidus’ ability to work with 100,000s more. By completing a week's worth of work in 10 minutes, attorneys will have the capacity to take on more cases and reduce the upfront legal costs when an everyday citizen is determining whether to bring a case to trial.
The Callidus operating system may lead to a systemic change in the way Americans engage with the legal system.
Read more about how Callidus plans to shape the future of legaltech, or check out their open roles on Cervin's job board.
