# Contract lifecycle management and e-signature for enterprise buyers: what AI models recommend, September 2026

Gane Index, September 2026 Edition. Asked as "contract lifecycle management platform" and as "e-signature and contract management tool", six framings each, to twelve models with search on, on behalf of an enterprise B2B company. Page: https://www.gane.ai/index/gtm/revops/contract-lifecycle-management-and-e-signature/2026-09/enterprise

This is the permanent record of the September 2026 Edition, published September 15, 2026 and superseded since. The current standing: https://www.gane.ai/index/gtm/revops/contract-lifecycle-management-and-e-signature/enterprise/index.md

**Standing:** Ironclad leads with 22% of first choices; verdict contested. 40 first choices across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts.

## First-choice share

| Rank | Product | Share | Negative rate | Labels |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | [Ironclad](https://www.gane.ai/index/gtm/vendors/ironclad/index.md) | 22% | 26% | 54 |
| 3 | [Sirion](https://www.gane.ai/index/gtm/vendors/sirion/index.md) | 12% | 15% | 33 |
| 4 | [Icertis Contract Intelligence](https://www.gane.ai/index/gtm/vendors/icertis-contract-intelligence/index.md) | 10% | 19% | 48 |
| 5 | [Agiloft Contract Management Suite](https://www.gane.ai/index/gtm/vendors/agiloft-contract-management-suite/index.md) | 10% | 10% | 41 |
| 7 | [DocuSign CLM](https://www.gane.ai/index/gtm/vendors/docusign-clm/index.md) | 8% | 33% | 43 |
| 9 | [Juro](https://www.gane.ai/index/gtm/vendors/juro/index.md) | 2% | 42% | 12 |
| 11 | [Conga CLM](https://www.gane.ai/index/gtm/vendors/conga-clm/index.md) | 0% | 24% | 37 |
| 12 | [SAP Ariba Contracts](https://www.gane.ai/index/gtm/vendors/sap-ariba-contracts/index.md) | 0% | 20% | 15 |
| 15 | [LinkSquares](https://www.gane.ai/index/gtm/vendors/linksquares/index.md) | 0% | 27% | 15 |

Rank is by share of first choices among all 62 products named; products with the same share are tied, and the order among them carries no meaning. The table lists those with at least 10 labels.

## Each model's first choice on the direct prompt

- Claude Haiku 4.5: Ironclad; alternatives Agiloft Contract Management Suite, LinkSquares, SAP Ariba Contracts
- GPT-5.4 mini: DocuSign CLM, Icertis Contract Intelligence; alternatives Conga CLM, Ironclad, Sirion
- Gemini 3.5 Flash: Ironclad; alternatives Agiloft Contract Management Suite, Conga CLM, DocuSign CLM, Icertis Contract Intelligence
- Perplexity Sonar: Sirion; alternatives Conga CLM, Icertis Contract Intelligence, Ironclad
- Grok 4.20: Ironclad; alternatives Conga CLM, DocuSign CLM, Sirion
- Mistral Small: Sirion; alternatives Agiloft Contract Management Suite, Conga CLM, DocuSign CLM, Icertis Contract Intelligence
- DeepSeek V4 Flash: Ironclad; alternatives Icertis Contract Intelligence, Sirion
- Llama 4 Maverick: no first choice
- Qwen 3.7 Flash: Ironclad; alternatives Conga CLM, DocuSign CLM
- Kimi K2: Icertis Contract Intelligence, Sirion; alternatives Agiloft Contract Management Suite, Conga CLM, DocuSign CLM, Ironclad
- GLM 4.7 FlashX: Sirion; alternatives Agiloft Contract Management Suite, Conga CLM, DocuSign CLM, Ironclad
- MiniMax M2.5: Icertis Contract Intelligence, Sirion; alternatives Agiloft Contract Management Suite, Conga CLM, DocuSign CLM, Ironclad

## Sources the answers cite

22 of 72 answers came back with a source list, from 4 of 12 models. Sites named in the most answers:

- sirion.ai: 16 answers, 31 citations
- ironcladapp.com: 10 answers, 11 citations
- gartner.com: 8 answers, 18 citations
- bindlegal.com: 8 answers, 12 citations
- getaccept.com: 8 answers, 9 citations
- docusign.com: 7 answers, 8 citations
- conga.com: 6 answers, 6 citations
- contractsafe.com: 5 answers, 10 citations

Pages named in the most answers:

- https://ironcladapp.com/journal/contract-management/best-contract-management-tools (8 answers)
- https://getaccept.com/blog/best-contract-management-software (7 answers)
- https://conga.com/resources/blog/contract-management-tools (6 answers)
- https://contractsafe.com/blog/best-contract-management-software (5 answers)
- https://bindlegal.com/resources/best-software/best-enterprise-clm (5 answers)
- https://gartner.com/reviews/market/contract-life-cycle-management (5 answers)
- https://juro.com/learn/clm-contract-lifecycle-management-software (5 answers)
- https://quickbase.com/blog/best-contract-lifecycle-management-software (5 answers)
- https://summize.com/clm-hub/best-clm-software (5 answers)
- https://techfundingnews.com/9-best-contract-lifecycle-management-platforms-for-procurement-teams-2026 (5 answers)

## Warned against

- Ironclad: 14 of 54 labels negative. "What to avoid at your scale - Per-seat-first vendors (Ironclad, DocuSign CLM, Conga):" (DeepSeek V4 Flash, budget prompt)
- Conga CLM: 9 of 37 labels negative. "What to avoid at your scale - Per-seat-first vendors (Ironclad, DocuSign CLM, Conga):" (DeepSeek V4 Flash, budget prompt)
- DocuSign CLM: 14 of 43 labels negative. "What to avoid at your scale ... DocuSign CLM runs $200K–$500K+ above 100 users" (DeepSeek V4 Flash, budget prompt)
- Icertis Contract Intelligence: 9 of 48 labels negative. "the most expensive ... the least friendly for wide, cost-predictable rollouts" (DeepSeek V4 Flash, budget prompt)

## Record

- Method: https://www.gane.ai/index/gtm/methodology
- License: CC BY 4.0. Cite as Gane Index, September 2026 Edition, www.gane.ai/index/gtm.