Why contracts are hard
Contracts are the document type where extraction errors cost the most. A missed liability cap is a procurement-cycle do-over. A misread renewal date is auto-renewal. A wrong governing-law field routes the dispute to the wrong jurisdiction. And every counterparty drafts differently — Section 8.3(b) of an MSA from a Fortune 500 looks nothing like the same clause from a SaaS startup. Generic OCR + keyword search misses 30–40% of obligations buried in compound sentences, definitions, and cross-references.
How Cogneris does it
Cogneris parses contracts semantically. The classifier identifies the contract type (MSA, SOW, NDA, DPA, employment, lease, vendor agreement, amendment) and routes to a type-specific schema. The extractor walks the document end-to-end — reading definitions, resolving cross-references, distinguishing operative clauses from boilerplate, and preserving the source-clause citation for every extracted field. The validator runs cross-clause checks (e.g., is the term-length consistent across the term clause and the renewal clause) and flags deviations from your playbook with severity ranking.
Sample extraction output
What you get out of the box
Every contract type
MSA, SOW, NDA, DPA, sub-processor agreement, employment, lease, vendor, supply, amendment. 30+ jurisdictions, multi-language with English-normalized fields.
Citation per field
Every extraction returns a page reference, section anchor, and bounding box. Click-through review surfaces the source clause; legal verifies in seconds.
Playbook deviation flags
Configure your standard positions and fallbacks per contract type; Cogneris flags every deviation with severity and the specific counterparty language.
Cross-clause validation
Term length, renewal trigger, notice period, governing law — Cogneris checks consistency across clauses and flags drafting errors before signature.
Integration patterns
Cogneris pushes structured contract metadata into the CLM systems legal teams already run. Ironclad — extracted fields populate the workflow record; deviation flags route to the assigned reviewer. DocuSign CLM — metadata write-back during the negotiation phase; full extraction on signed agreements. Conga CLM, ContractWorks, LinkSquares, Spotdraft, Juro — pre-built connectors with field-mapping templates per contract type. Salesforce — Account, Opportunity, and Contract objects updated on signature event. Custom and homegrown legal systems — drop normalized JSON into the REST API or use webhooks for event-driven flows.
Compliance & trust
Contracts are among the most sensitive documents an organization handles. Cogneris retains them encrypted at rest with per-tenant keys (Customer-Managed Encryption Keys available on Enterprise), restricts engineer access to documented break-glass workflows with reviewer approval, and offers configurable retention from 0 to 7 years. Audit metadata captures every extraction, review, and export with timestamp and requestor identity — ready for legal-hold or external auditor review. See our trust page for the full posture: encryption, tenant isolation, sub-processors, GDPR DPA, CCPA, SOC 2 Type II in progress, and HIPAA BAA on Enterprise.
Get started
Pay-per-page pricing means you can start an evaluation today without an annual commit. Most legal teams ship their first contract extraction into production within 2 weeks and reach steady-state accuracy on their counterparty mix in under 60 days.
Related extractors
Cogneris extracts dozens of structured document types. The closest neighbors to contract extraction:
- Invoice extraction — vendor, line items, GL-code hints, and totals for AP automation.
- KYC document extraction — government IDs, proof of address, and beneficial ownership certifications used for counterparty due diligence.
- Insurance claim extraction — carriers, dates of loss, coverage codes, and amounts from claim packets that often reference underlying contracts.
For broader context, see the IDP buyer's guide, the 2026 State of Document AI report, or estimate ROI at your volume.