A structured AI workflow for IPOs

Cooley developed GO Public as a proprietary AI product built on ChatGPT Work. The offering is designed to help lawyers work through the extensive information and repeated tasks involved in preparing a company for an initial public offering.

The firm describes the system as an agentic harness that analyzes information and creates a tailored starting point for an IPO. Lawyers then review and validate the work, rather than treating the system’s output as a substitute for professional analysis.

David Wang, Cooley’s chief innovation officer, said IPO work requires teams to manage thousands of tasks continuously. In that setting, the product is intended to help surface relevant issues earlier and make the initial organization of information more intelligent.

Starting with the client instead of a template

Before GO Public, Cooley teams often began with a precedent from a comparable company and adapted it to the client’s circumstances. The new workflow instead starts with the client and brings together information supplied by the company, relevant public sources and carefully curated precedents.

That combination is intended to give lawyers a more tailored foundation for their work. The system does not remove the need to assess whether information is relevant or whether a proposed disclosure fits the specific transaction. Its stated role is to improve the first cut of the material so lawyers can spend more time examining the issues that require expertise.

Dave Peinsipp, a Cooley partner and co-chair of its global capital markets group, described an IPO as one of the most consequential moments in a company’s life. He said GO Public is intended to reduce the time required for intensive preparation and leave lawyers and management teams more room for decisions that shape the transaction.

Encoding Cooley’s capital-markets expertise

Cooley says its legal engineers, innovation counsel and practicing lawyers worked together to translate the firm’s capital-markets experience into the product. The firm also works with OpenAI to combine subject-matter knowledge with AI engineering expertise.

The agentic harness provides a controlled sequence for the system’s work. It specifies which steps agents can perform automatically, which steps require lawyer review or validation and how the separate outputs are assembled. This structure is intended to keep responsibility and professional oversight visible throughout the process.

Wang said information drawn from previous analyses provides what he called “baked-in know-how.” The description refers to curated knowledge and processes incorporated into the workflow, rather than an unrestricted system operating without defined controls.

Redirecting effort toward judgment

According to Cooley, GO Public’s main benefit is not simply completing familiar work faster. The firm says the system can bring intelligence to a large body of information that previously had to be sorted manually, allowing lawyers to concentrate on the most important questions after that initial review.

Peinsipp referred to this approach as “speed to quality.” In his description, the objective is to reach a strong starting point sooner so lawyers can spend more time applying judgment, challenging disclosure and thinking strategically about issues that matter most to the company.

The same shift may affect management teams. Preparing for an IPO competes with the work of running a fast-moving business, and Cooley says a more organized legal process can help executives direct their attention toward the broader decisions involved in taking a company public.

A broader change in capital-markets work

Cooley operates internationally and has a reputation for advising companies on capital markets and IPOs. OpenAI’s account says the firm advised on 180 deals globally in 2025, representing more than $51.5 billion in deal volume. It also describes Cooley as having a decade-long record at the top of the US issuer-side IPO market and having advised on more venture-backed IPOs than any other firm over the past 20-plus years.

The firm presents GO Public as part of a wider reconsideration of how capital-markets work is delivered. Wang said the legal industry has traditionally been relatively resistant to change, while AI provides an opportunity to rethink processes without removing the professional duties and accountability expected of attorneys.

Peinsipp said the product represents Cooley’s vision for the future of capital-markets practice. The firm sees the approach extending beyond IPO preparation to capital-markets transactions more broadly, although the source does not specify additional products, rollout dates or measured time savings.

Sources

• OpenAI NewsHow Cooley is accelerating IPO work with ChatGPT