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Community Spotlight: Garrett Ordower, Partner, Scale LLP

By John Freund |
April 3, 2025

Community Spotlight: Garrett Ordower, Partner, Scale LLP

Garrett is a seasoned attorney and head of Scale LLP’s Litigation Finance Team. With extensive experience across both commercial and consumer litigation finance sectors, Garrett brings a uniquely comprehensive perspective to the field. He has developed specialized expertise in sourcing, evaluating, structuring, and managing diverse funding arrangements, from single-case investments to complex law firm portfolio facilities. Throughout his career, Garrett has successfully navigated intricate and often contentious workouts involving various stakeholders, including claimholders, attorneys, funders, and medical providers.

Beyond traditional litigation finance, Garrett has emerged as a thought leader in legal innovation. He advises on sophisticated structuring and ethics issues for startups in litigation finance, LegalTech, JusticeTech, and advises on a broad range of ethics issues including emerging issues relating to the use of artificial intelligence to deliver legal services to both consumers and businesses. His expertise extends to alternative business structures and two-company models that enable innovative legal service delivery while maintaining ethical compliance. Garrett is licensed to practice in New York, Illinois, and Arizona.

Garrett began his career as a litigator at Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz, engaging in significant litigation and white collar matters. He then transitioned to one of the pioneering commercial litigation funders, Lake Whillans Litigation Finance, as a managing director. At Lake Whillans, Garrett participated in tens of millions in litigation finance deals including asset purchases, law firm lending portfolios, and claimholder funding. His articles on litigation finance topics have been widely published, and he was recognized as one of Lawdragon’s Global 100 Leaders in Litigation Finance.

Garrett then joined Mighty Group, Inc., as its General Counsel following the company’s Series B raise. He handled all legal aspects of Mighty’s significant consumer litigation finance portfolio, which included investments in medical receivables, pre-settlement advances, and law firm lending. Garrett also played a pivotal role in helping Mighty create an innovative tech-forward competitor to existing personal injury law firms.

Since joining Scale, Garrett has focused his practice on helping innovative companies in the legal and litigation finance spaces. As head of the Litigation Finance Team, Garrett has helped litigation finance companies with fund structures, commercial and consumer transactions, and ethics and regulatory advice. Garrett has also advised a wide variety of LegalTech and JusticeTech companies on structuring their businesses in order to achieve their goals in an ethical and compliant manner, including doing so through the use of AI.

Prior to practicing, Garrett graduated from the University of Chicago Law School where he was Editor-in-Chief of the University of Chicago Law Review, and clerked on the Northern District of Illinois and the Second Circuit Court of Appeals. Garrett maintains an active pro bono practice and recently secured the vacatur of his client’s manslaughter conviction. Prior to law school, Garrett worked as a newspaper reporter and investigative journalist.

Company Name and Description: Scale LLP, a full-service, national law firm that rethinks the traditional law firm model. Scale provides a tech-forward, distributed platform that reduces overhead and increases efficiency to offer the best legal talent at a competitive price-point.

Company Website: scalefirm.com

Year Founded: 2017

Headquarters: San Francisco, CA

Area of Focus: Scale LLP’s Litigation Finance Team delivers comprehensive solutions across the entire litigation funding ecosystem. We provide specialized counsel to litigation finance companies, claimholders, law firms, and investors, drawing on our team’s firsthand experience having worked on all sides of litigation finance transactions. Our services encompass fund formation, deal structuring, portfolio construction, regulatory compliance, and workout solutions and litigation related to distressed assets.

Our practice uniquely bridges both commercial and consumer litigation finance sectors, allowing us to develop innovative hybrid approaches that maximize return while managing risk appropriately. We combine deep litigation experience with sophisticated financial structuring capabilities to deliver practical advice on complex transactions ranging from single-case investments to multi-jurisdictional portfolio facilities.

Beyond traditional litigation finance, we lead the field in advising LegalTech and JusticeTech companies on cutting-edge business models that navigate regulatory complexity while promoting greater access to justice. We provide guidance on artificial intelligence implementation in legal services, addressing both the transformative potential and ethical challenges presented by these technologies. Our attorneys have pioneered compliant structures for alternative business arrangements in both traditional and emerging jurisdictions, helping clients develop sustainable competitive advantages through regulatory innovation.

Member Quote: “I work at the intersection of law, finance, and technology because I believe these convergent forces can transform our legal system. By leveraging litigation finance, legal innovation, and AI tools thoughtfully, we can build a more equitable legal landscape where outcomes are determined by merits rather than resources. Every day, I work with visionaries who are dismantling outdated structures and creating something more efficient, accessible, and just. This evolution not only enhances access to justice but also creates compelling investment opportunities in a market ripe for transformation.”

About the author

John Freund

John Freund

Commercial

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Commercial Fundraising

Loopa Finance Closes $70 Million Fund III

Loopa Finance has announced the successful closing of its third litigation finance vehicle, raising USD 70 million and pushing the firm’s total capital commitments past the USD 100 million mark since inception. The milestone underscores the continued maturation of the litigation funding market across continental Europe and Latin America, where Loopa has positioned itself as a tech-driven, cross-border player focused on complex disputes.

A press release issued by Loopa Finance confirms that the new fund builds on two prior vehicles totaling USD 38 million, both of which have been fully deployed into meritorious cases across key jurisdictions in Europe and Latin America. With Fund III, Loopa intends to deepen its investment capacity in judicial litigation and complex arbitrations, while accelerating geographic expansion across strategic markets on both continents.

Co-founder and Managing Partner Fernando Folgueiro described the fundraise as a “turning point” from a legal-business perspective, noting that surpassing USD 100 million in commitments reflects growing market acceptance of litigation finance within the regional legal ecosystem. The firm emphasized its model of assuming litigation risk in exchange for a return only upon successful outcomes, while maintaining non-interference in legal strategy. Loopa invests across a broad range of disputes, including commercial and investment arbitration, corporate and contractual claims, insolvency proceedings, intellectual property matters, environmental disputes, and claims against the State.

Co-founder Yago Zavalia Gahan highlighted the firm’s continued investment in technology and scalable processes, reinforcing Loopa’s positioning as the first tech-focused litigation funder operating across both Latin America and continental Europe. Fund III attracted a mix of institutional and private investors from Europe and the Americas, including returning backers and new strategic participants.

As capital formation in emerging and cross-border markets accelerates, Loopa’s latest raise signals sustained investor confidence in litigation finance as an asset class beyond traditional Anglo-American jurisdictions—raising the question of how quickly regional regulatory frameworks and court practices will evolve alongside that growth.

Case Developments Commercial

Legal-Bay Spotlights $8.5M Uber Verdict in Arizona

By John Freund |

Legal-Bay has highlighted an $8.5 million jury verdict against Uber in an Arizona bellwether sexual assault trial, a result that may influence settlement postures across similar dockets. The Arizona jury found Uber liable and awarded damages to a plaintiff who alleged assault connected to the rideshare platform.

While case specifics remain limited in the public domain, the outcome provides another data point on potential exposure as claims advance nationwide. For funders and plaintiffs’ counsel, the verdict offers a reference point for damages modeling and negotiation strategy. Bellwether trials often test liability theories and damages presentations ahead of broader resolution, giving parties a benchmark for risk assessment. The Arizona ruling arrives as plaintiffs pursue a range of claims tied to driver misconduct and platform oversight.

An article in PR Newswire states that Legal-Bay characterized the case as a bellwether matter and underscored the significance of the $8.5 million award. The company reiterated that it provides pre settlement funding to claimants pursuing sexual assault lawsuits against rideshare companies, positioning capital to help plaintiffs bridge lengthy litigation timelines.

The report notes that ongoing proceedings involving Uber have drawn heightened attention to driver screening, in-app safety features, and incident response protocols. According to the release, Legal-Bay views the Arizona result as instructive for counsel evaluating case posture and timing of potential resolutions. The release also encourages potential claimants to consult their attorneys and consider non recourse advances where appropriate.

Commercial

Litigation Finance Supports Access to Justice

By John Freund |

Misconceptions about third party funding continue to surface in policy debates and courtrooms, yet the commercial litigation finance market has become a practical bridge to justice for businesses facing costly disputes.

An article in Mondaq explains that funding enables claimholders to pursue meritorious cases without diverting operating capital, particularly when litigation spend and duration are unpredictable. It also addresses recurring critiques, including allegations of funder control, the risk of frivolous filings, and opaque arrangements. Industry participants point to non recourse structures, rigorous underwriting, and counsel independence as guardrails that align incentives. For corporate legal departments, financing can rebalance negotiating dynamics against well capitalized adversaries, support portfolio based risk management, and preserve budgets for core projects. As interest rates and legal costs rise, the economic rationale for external capital has only strengthened.

Commercial litigation finance remains an important access to justice tool in the United States, countering false narratives that have colored recent commentary. It explains that most agreements are non recourse, so funders recover only from successful outcomes, which moderates risk taking and screens out weak claims. The piece notes that funders contract for information rights and consent on settlement only in limited circumstances, while strategic decisions remain with clients and counsel under ethics rules and court oversight.

It also observes that funding can complement contingency arrangements, after the event insurance, and defense side budgeting, creating optionality for both plaintiffs and defendants. On disclosure, the article surveys a patchwork of rules and argues that blanket mandates could chill capital formation without improving case management, favoring targeted judicial inquiries instead.

Expect continued legislative and rulemaking activity on disclosure and conflicts management, alongside growing adoption of voluntary best practices. As data sets on funded matters mature, stakeholders will seek more empirical analysis of outcomes and impacts on settlement dynamics. Cross border frameworks and portfolio structures are likely to expand as corporate users normalize funding within broader capital planning.