Dele Tosh, founder of Protomated

The founder

I was going to be a lawyer.

My career took me into engineering instead — 13 years building systems for Fortune 1000 companies, plus a tech venture I built and sold. But my brain never stopped thinking like a lawyer: systematic, reasoned, and drawn to the rules that make systems work.

That’s why Protomated exists. I understand how attorneys think because I almost became one, and I build software because that’s what I was trained to do. Over the years, I kept seeing the same problem nobody was fixing: solo and small-firm attorneys buried in operational busywork, with no one to help them dig out.

The pattern I kept seeing

Solo and small firm attorneys losing half their day to work that a system could handle. Enterprise tools priced for BigLaw. Generic tools that ignore bar rules. No one at the table offering hands-on help at a price that fits a three-attorney practice.

So we built LegalContext — not as a product strategy, but as a way to understand attorney workflows from the inside. We had hundreds of conversations with solo attorneys about how they actually spend their days: what consumes their mornings, where revenue slips away, and which follow-ups fall through the cracks. We wanted to prove we understood the work before asking anyone to hire us for it.

Protomated is the result: a consulting practice with its own engineering team, backed by real software, built for the solo and small-firm attorneys that BigLaw-priced vendors skip. Flat pricing, one measurable metric per engagement, and a guarantee on that number.

How we work

Four principles behind every engagement, every tool recommendation, and every line of code we ship.

01

Listen first, then build

Every engagement starts with understanding how you actually work. Not how we think you should. Our consulting practice and our software both come from the same place. Watch real workflows before prescribing anything.

02

Legal-specific, not generic

Generic automation advice is dangerous in a profession governed by ethics rules and confidentiality obligations. Everything we recommend is reviewed against bar guidance, client data handling rules, and the tools your practice already runs on.

03

Simplicity over sophistication

If you can’t operate what we built without an IT department, we haven’t done our job. The best automation is the one you forget is running. Complexity is a cost, not a feature.

04

ROI first, or not at all

We scope the number before we scope the work. One measurable metric per Build, written into the SOW. If we miss it, we keep going or we refund. You deal with enough uncertainty in your cases. We won’t add more.

Built for solo and small firms, nationwide

We earn trust by building, not by pitching.

Solo and small firms work the hardest week in law. They juggle multi-stage matters and hard deadlines, field client messages across every channel (immigration practices often in three languages over WhatsApp), and make do with a software stack built for BigLaw budgets. We built our practice around that reality.

Solo and small firm attorneys don’t hire consultants from a slide deck. They hire the team that already understands their daily grind and can prove it. That’s why we built LegalContext first, and why every engagement starts with a measured number we put in writing.

Practice-area awareIntake, follow-ups, and dormant-client win-back built around how your practice actually runs, with deep roots in immigration.
CLE-format presenterOperations, automation, tool evaluation, and the ABA Opinion 512 compliance framework for all of it.
National practiceServing solo and small firms up to 10 attorneys across the U.S. Remote-first, on your stack.
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Builders, not just advisors

Our engineers built LegalContext. We ship code, not just slide decks.

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Privacy-first

We’ve seen what a breach costs. Security and privacy aren’t features — they’re the starting point.

Prior tech exit

Built and sold before. We know what sustainable looks like. We’re not chasing growth at your expense.

Want to work together?

Start with the free assessment. Or book a call. Or follow along as we build.