Most legal tech companies start with software and look for problems to solve. Steno started with the problems — and built the software around them.
That approach is paying off. The Los Angeles-based company, which combines court reporting services with an AI-powered litigation platform, has raised $49 million in a Series C funding round. The round was led by Savano Capital Partners, with continued participation from First Round Capital and The Legal Tech Fund, bringing Steno’s total capital raised to $150 million.
The funding arrives at an inflection point for legal AI — a sector that has attracted billions in venture capital but has struggled to prove its value inside the actual day-to-day workflows of litigation teams. Steno’s pitch is that it has cracked that problem in a way competitors haven’t, and the investor interest suggests the legal tech world is paying attention.
The Hybrid Model That Sets Steno Apart
What makes Steno unusual in the legal technology space is that it isn’t purely a software company. Alongside its tech platform, it operates as an active court reporting services firm — meaning it has direct, ongoing relationships with the attorneys, paralegals, and court reporters who use its tools in real cases.
That operational layer gives Steno something most AI startups lack: access to real litigation workflow data. Rather than training on synthetic examples or publicly available legal documents, Steno builds its product roadmap directly from the friction points its own service teams encounter every day.
The result is a platform that law firms actually use. Thousands of firms now rely on Steno’s services monthly, and the company has set its sights on deeper penetration within the AmLaw 200 — the ranking of the largest law firms in the United States by gross revenue — as a primary growth target.
Transcript Genius: AI That Earns Its Name
The centerpiece of Steno’s product suite is Transcript Genius, an AI-powered tool built specifically for transcript analysis in litigation. The product launched in 2024 and quickly became the platform’s strongest driver of user retention.
The latest iteration goes further than text search. Transcript Genius now links deposition transcripts directly to corresponding video footage, so attorneys can click any line of a transcript and immediately pull up the exact video segment. The integration covers historical depositions as well as new ones, and requires no additional setup or downloads on the user’s end.
For litigators, the practical value is significant. Reviewing witness demeanor during depositions has traditionally meant scrubbing through hours of video with a transcript open in a separate window. Steno has collapsed that process into a single interface — and in high-stakes litigation, where deposition strategy can make or break a case, the time savings translate directly into competitive advantage.
CEO Greg Hong described Transcript Genius as solving “real workflow friction” that had long gone unaddressed in the industry, and pointed to the tool’s impact on user retention as evidence that the product had hit a genuine need rather than a manufactured one.
What the Capital Will Fund
Steno has been clear about how it intends to deploy the Series C. The company plans to triple its investment in both geographic expansion and product development, with Transcript Genius’s next generation as the primary technical focus.
COO Prabhdeep Singh framed the round as a milestone in combining personalized service delivery with technology — a reflection of the company’s belief that legal AI succeeds when it enhances expert human service rather than attempting to replace it.
That positioning puts Steno in a different lane from AI tools that promise to automate legal work outright. Attorneys, particularly in high-stakes commercial litigation, are resistant to fully automated solutions that remove human judgment from sensitive decisions. Steno’s model offers AI-powered efficiency within a framework that keeps experienced professionals in the loop.
Legal AI’s Real Test
The legal tech market has seen significant investment in 2026, but the sector is maturing quickly. Early enthusiasm for generic AI tools inside law firms has given way to harder questions: Does the tool actually save time? Can it be trusted with sensitive case data? Does it hold up under the scrutiny of client billing?
Steno has answered those questions with its hybrid approach — building the software, running the service, and iterating on both based on real case outcomes. For a sector that has historically been slow to adopt new technology, that combination of hands-on delivery and intelligent tooling may be the formula that finally makes legal AI stick.
With $150 million in total capital and thousands of firms already on the platform, Steno is no longer making a promise. It’s showing receipts.
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