Chris Beecham
About Chris Beecham
Chris Beecham is a Technical Lead with extensive experience in legal technology and document management. He holds an MSc in Computer Science from Birkbeck, University of London, and a Master's Degree in Law from Christ's College, Cambridge.
Work at Thomson Reuters
Chris Beecham has served as a Technical Lead at Thomson Reuters since 2013, following a previous tenure from 1997 to 2013. In this role, he has been responsible for leading various technical projects, including the development of functionalities that enhance legal document processing and search capabilities. His work involves integrating advanced technologies to improve the efficiency and quality of legal information delivery.
Education and Expertise
Chris Beecham studied at Birkbeck, University of London, where he earned a Master of Science in Computer Science from 1997 to 2000. He also studied Law at Christ's College, Cambridge, achieving a Master's Degree from 1987 to 1991. His educational background provides a strong foundation for his expertise in XML publishing design architecture, DTD design, and single source publishing using XSLT.
Background
Chris Beecham began his career as a Legal Journalist at Chambers and Partners from 1994 to 1996. His transition to technical roles began at Thomson Reuters, where he developed skills in XML representation of legal agreements, taxonomies, and topic maps. His extensive experience in both legal and technical fields informs his current work in legal technology.
Achievements
During his career, Chris Beecham has led significant projects aimed at enhancing legal document processing. Notable contributions include improving Practical Law Company's coverage of UK and EU legislation using data from legislation.gov.uk and leggov mashup. He has also implemented type ahead functionality for search using Elasticsearch and developed customized outputs of legal agreements in Word using WordML and XSLT.