My name is Leonard Hope. I’ve been working out of GridAKL on and off for almost two years now. During that time, I’ve met lots of incredible people using AI to build new solutions faster than ever before. This is happening even in industries historically resistant to change, like the legal industry, where I do most of my work.
I’m a U.S. patent lawyer based in Auckland, and for the last six months I’ve been using AI to build tools to help IP lawyers do their jobs more efficiently and, most importantly, better.
I started by building a task management application (www.taskspect.app) I’d envisioned for years, but didn’t have the coding skills to make it a reality. Since then, I’ve built a suite of tools for patent lawyers that help them deliver better outcomes for their clients. You can find them on my GitHub (github.com/LeonardHope) if you’d like to learn more.
What really excites me about the current state of AI tools is that if you can clearly envision the thing you want to build, you can probably make it a reality.
I find that incredibly empowering. And when today’s models can’t quite get there, you can likely wait a few months and try again with a newer one. I had that experience recently with a project Claude Code had struggled with four months earlier. The latest versions of Claude Code and Codex easily built what I had in mind.
I hope to see you around GridAKL sometime and learn about what you’re building. Until then, you can connect with me on LinkedIn.
