Cost containment implies both reducing costs and making them more predictable. As the volume of data rises, legal departments face increasing pressure to reduce their budgets, while law firms are under pressure to deliver greater value by offering more services at lower fees and providing greater visibility of the costs incurred throughout the entire discovery process. The need to balance costs against risks is so crucial, that corporations are willing to live with a certain degree of quantified and managed risk in order to reduce their cost of e-discovery. So, how can costs be significantly reduced and yet balanced against risk?