Tech procurement contracts can be high value (£100k - £5m), regulated, and stakeholder-heavy. Banking and Finance NDAs, meanwhile, are “small” documents that often carry outsized risk - and if they stall, deals, opportunities and revenue stall with them.

We began supporting a large global financial institution on tech procurement contracts in 2017. By 2024, our partnership had grown to include NDAs and was operating at critical mass keeping both streams moving:

Our work was centred around making two critical tasks easier to complete consistently, at volume, with the right risk decisions made by the right people.

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Task 1: “Execute mid-to large value tech deals quickly, with fewer surprises and escalations”

Procurement needed a service that could manage a steady flow of technology contracting - often regulated and involving multiple stakeholders, without creating bottlenecks for the business or constant escalations back to in-house teams.

The friction and barriers

• High volume + high variability: even “mid-tier” tech deals can become complex quickly depending on scope, data, and operational risk. 
• Stakeholder-heavy approvals: legal, risk, procurement, and business teams all need clarity - fast. 
• Escalations are expensive: every unnecessary escalation adds cycle time and pulls in senior attention. 

Complexity spikes: for higher-complexity matters (e.g., material outsourcing arrangements), the client needed deeper coordination and additional expertise without losing continuity or institutional context.

Radiant operated as a managed service partner to procurement - handling intake, drafting, review, and negotiation and scaling-up support for higher-complexity matters coordinating with client teams and strategic external partners where needed.

Radiant also invested in the operating system around the legal work, not only the legal work itself.

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Task 2: “Turn Banking & Finance NDAs around fast enough to realise investment opportunities quickly and safely”

Front-office legal teams needed a reliable way to process NDA volume quickly. NDAs were critical to onboarding new investment opportunities, and turnaround times mattered - yet risk still had to be balanced carefully.

In 2025, Radiant handled 3,048 Banking & Finance NDAs, and volume increased 33% year-on-year, raising the stakes for speed, consistency, and quality.

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The friction and barriers

• Speed pressure: the front office needs fast NDAs to engage on opportunities. 
• Risk isn’t uniform: not every NDA is equal; some require tighter guardrails. ‍
• Volume magnifies inconsistency: small drafting differences create confusion, negotiation churn, and review fatigue.

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Radiant introduced service improvements designed for speed and control across the two core engagement areas:

NDAs:

• Concierge service (triage + client-care layer): improved responsiveness and made it easier to route work correctly from the start. 
• Precedents bank: curated fallback positions and template agreements to handle volume efficiently. 
• Revised risk review template (tailored to bank-specific risks): gave business teams and risk controllers clearer guidance and more autonomy on standard decisions. ‍
• Simplified intake process: iterative changes reduced friction and cut down back-and-forth, improving deal flow.

Tech Contracts:

• Playbook enhancements: clearer positions on standard terms reduced unnecessary escalations and accelerated negotiation. 
• Standardised templates: reduced time spent answering basic asks and increased consistency. ‍
• Call-off checklist: improved risk visibility and streamlined internal communication.

These changes were operational fixes aimed at reducing rework, avoiding avoidable escalations, and making standard decisions easier for the business and risk teams to own.

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Faster cycles, fewer escalations, clearer division of labour

The client’s experience (in their own words) centres on institutional knowledge, practicality, and visibility:

A Legal team member said “Radiant’s team know the bank, that’s very important for us. You have that vital institutional knowledge. Radiant lawyers bring good practices to our contracting, tell us how things could be improved, how drafting could be changed. The communication and data are fantastic. Radiant has a very tech friendly team. Sharing data and intuitive dashboards gives us all the extra insight we need”

While one of the business team commented: “Radiant know in-house best practice, and are informed in areas like procurement management and data protection. I find the support to be very hands-on and pragmatic. Your overall goal is to support and complete the agreement, not negotiate every word with a legal frame of mind - your approach is extremely practical. We have great feedback sessions or simple straightforward feedback in emails, just focusing on things that really matter. I love your style.”

In practice, our work translated into:

• Faster contract cycles (through better intake, templates, and playbooks) 
• Fewer escalations (through clearer fallback positions and risk guidance) ‍
• A smarter division of labour between Legal, Risk, and the business (so the right people make the right calls at the right time)

The partnership continues to evolve - focusing on helping the client meet strategic priorities with more agility and less friction across procurement contracting and front-office NDAs.