---
title: Ex-Legora Engineers Launch Athena, a Commercial Real Estate Law Firm Built on AI
description: Athena, an AI-native commercial real estate law firm from former Legora engineers Cem Ucan and Kieran John Keenan, raises $2.5M led by a16z Speedrun.
author: Darie Nani (Editor-in-Chief)
date: 2026-11-03T13:49:27.606Z
updated: 2026-11-03T13:49:27.632Z
canonical: https://www.sovereignmagazine.com/article/commercial-real-estate-lawyer-athena
image: https://cdn.nanimediahouse.com/athena-founders-hero-v1.webp
categories: Artificial Intelligence, Startups
content_type: Profile
region: San Francisco
publication: Sovereign Magazine
schema_type: Article
about:
  - type: Person
    name: Cem Ucan
    description: Cem Ucan is co-founder and chief executive of Athena, an AI-native commercial real estate law firm. He spent years in Big Law and worked in legal innovation at Baker McKenzie before joining legal AI company Legora in 2024 as a founding legal engineer, where he helped the company reach its first $100 million in annual recurring revenue.
    jobTitle: Co-Founder and CEO
    worksFor: Athena
  - type: Person
    name: Kieran John Keenan
    description: Kieran John Keenan is co-founder and chief technology officer of Athena, an AI-native commercial real estate law firm. He studied law at the University of Oslo, founded a startup that built an automated legal reasoning system, and was the founding evaluations engineer at legal AI company Legora.
    jobTitle: Co-Founder and CTO
    worksFor: Athena
---

Cem Ucan and Kieran John Keenan, early engineers at legal AI company Legora, have started their own commercial real estate law firm, Athena, where AI agents prepare the deal documents and attorneys check and approve them before they reach the client.

The San Francisco firm has raised $2.5 million in a pre-seed round led by [a16z Speedrun](https://www.sovereignmagazine.com/article/space-a16z-speedrun-streaming-filesystem). It advises commercial real estate investors on acquisitions, sales and financing, from purchase agreements and due diligence to loan documents and closings, and charges a fixed fee per transaction that the company says is typically 30% to 50% less than clients paid on their recent deals. The legal services are provided by its affiliated firm, Athena Circle, whose attorneys make every legal decision.

## Cem Ucan and Kieran John Keenan at Legora

Ucan spent years in Big Law, at one point billing 3,000 hours a year, before moving into legal innovation at Baker McKenzie. He joined Legora in 2024 as a founding legal engineer, a lawyer working with the firms that use its software, and helped the company reach its first $100 million in annual recurring revenue while looking after some of its largest accounts, including Cleary Gottlieb, Goodwin, Linklaters and Norton Rose Fulbright.

Keenan studied law at the University of Oslo and founded a startup that built an automated legal reasoning system. At Legora he was the founding evaluations engineer, setting up the systems the company uses to test and improve its AI across drafting, research and agent-based work.

Legora, whose software is used by more than 2,400 law firms and corporate legal departments, raised $550 million in October at an $8.8 billion valuation. Working there, Ucan and Keenan saw what the technology could do for lawyers and how hard it was to sell to firms that charge by the hour. Athena started with a prototype Keenan built that turned hundreds of documents into a first-draft due diligence report. José Braz, who developed Legora's legal research agent, joined as founding engineer, and he and Keenan built the deal platform the firm now runs on.

## Fixed Fees for Commercial Real Estate Legal Work

Most [legal AI is sold to firms](https://www.sovereignmagazine.com/article/harvey-legal-ai-talks-15-5-billion-valuation) that earn their money from billable hours, so when the software turns ten hours of work into two, the firm bills eight fewer hours. Athena charges a fixed fee for each transaction, so it keeps the benefit of the hours its software saves and can pass part of it to clients as a lower price.

"Most legal AI companies sell tools to traditional law firms. We took a different approach," said Ucan, Athena's chief executive. "Our AI works hand-in-hand with a law firm designed around it from day one, with experienced attorneys focused on the judgment and negotiation that actually move deals forward."

Faster legal work makes a material difference to commercial real estate investors completing 10 to 15 acquisitions a year. Athena has signed 22 clients in the two months since it launched, and some of them make several offers a week and submit dozens of offers for every deal they close, so once a property goes under contract, every day counts.

Ucan and Keenan expect the number of deals to rise as loans taken out in 2021 and 2022 to buy commercial property, many on three- to five-year terms, come due and push owners to refinance or sell. The [Mortgage Bankers Association](https://newslink.mba.org/mba-newslinks/2026/february/mba-newslink-tuesday-feb-10-2026/17-of-commercial-and-multifamily-mortgage-balances-to-mature-in-2026/) puts the commercial and multifamily mortgages maturing in 2026 at $875 billion, 17% of the $5 trillion outstanding.

## AI Agents and Attorneys on Each Real Estate Transaction

Clients deal with Athena as they would with any law firm, sending documents to their attorney and getting legal work back. When a new agreement comes in, Athena's agents check it against the agreed deal terms, flag inconsistencies, prepare redlines and draft messages to the client, drawing on earlier transactions to learn each client's negotiating preferences. An attorney then reviews the work, makes the legal decisions and approves it before the client sees it. The firm's attorneys include Karen Abesamis, a former corporate and M&A partner at Morgan Lewis, and Juan B. Soto, formerly of Lowenstein Sandler.

> "I measure our progress by how quickly an attorney can review an AI agent's work and confidently stand behind it."
> — Kieran John Keenan

Keenan, Athena's chief technology officer, says a draft produced in minutes is of little use if a lawyer still needs hours to check it, so the platform is designed around the attorney's review. Athena feeds every attorney correction and client preference back into the system, and in its first six weeks it cut attorney review time by more than 70%, the company says.

On an early transaction, the team turned around a purchase agreement in under 48 hours, the fastest turnaround that client said it had experienced.

"A lot of firms in our industry have an AI task force in name only," said L. Miguel Arce, chief executive of Mox, a Texas-based multifamily real estate investment, property management and development company. "What stood out about Athena is that the system learns from every deal, from what the attorneys change to what we prefer. Speed only matters if it's quality work, and the Athena platform gets us both."

## Athena's Plans Beyond Commercial Real Estate

> "Our ambition is to free a 21st-century economy from a 19th-century legal delivery model."
> — Cem Ucan

Athena plans to expand across property types and geographies and later into other areas of transactional law, with the aim of cutting legal work that now takes weeks down to hours.

"As AI becomes more capable, clients will still want experienced professionals who take responsibility for the work," said Troy Kirwin, a partner at a16z Speedrun. "Athena is building around that need, with a system that can improve through real legal work and a team obsessed with scaling fast."

**About Athena**

Athena is a San Francisco commercial real estate law firm whose proprietary AI agents work alongside experienced transactional attorneys on acquisitions, sales and financing, from purchase agreements and due diligence to loan documents and closings. Legal services are provided by its affiliated firm, Athena Circle, at fixed fees. It was founded by former Legora staff Cem Ucan and Kieran John Keenan and is backed by a16z Speedrun.

[Website](https://www.athena.lawyer/)

## FAQ

**Q: How much does a commercial real estate attorney cost?**
Most commercial real estate attorneys bill by the hour, so the cost of a deal depends on how long the documents and negotiations take. Athena charges a fixed fee for each transaction instead, which the company says is typically 30% to 50% below what its clients paid on their recent deals.

**Q: What is an AI-native law firm?**
It is a law firm set up around its own AI from the start, rather than a traditional firm that buys AI tools. At Athena, AI agents review documents, prepare redlines and draft client communications, and attorneys at its affiliated firm, Athena Circle, make the legal decisions and approve all work before it reaches clients.

**Q: Who founded Athena?**
Cem Ucan, the chief executive, and Kieran John Keenan, the chief technology officer. Both worked at Legora, Ucan as a founding legal engineer after years as a Big Law attorney, and Keenan as its founding evaluations engineer.

**Q: How fast can Athena prepare a purchase agreement?**
On an early transaction, Athena turned around a purchase agreement in under 48 hours, the fastest the client said it had seen. Attorney review time fell by more than 70% in the firm's first six weeks, the company says.