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The folks at Van Buren-based Loislaw.com took it personally when the new CEO of one of their biggest competitors mentioned Arkansas in a recent interview with the Wall Street Journal.

The executive was Crispin Davis, head of Anglo-Dutch publisher Reed Elsevier NV, which owns, among other things, the legal database Lexis-Nexis. Reed Elsevier is laying off 1,500 people and embarking on a three-year, $1.2 billion overhaul. The bulk of that investment — 90 percent — is earmarked for Internet projects, including Lexis-Nexis.

But what really caught their attention at Loislaw was this comment from Davis, who was talking about customizing his company’s products: A big New York law firm “clearly requires a very different product than a small lawyer in Arkansas.”

Now why would someone in London single out Arkansas unless the competition from Loislaw’s own legal database service was heating up?

“We see that as a validation if they have to take shots at us like that and if they have to take jabs,” said Mike Romanies, vice president of marketing for Loislaw. “We must really be hurting them.”

Lexis-Nexis and Westlaw have dominated the legal database business, but Westlaw’s parent is also refocusing. The Thomson Corp. recently announced it would sell all of its newspapers but one, The Globe and Mail in Toronto. Thomson plans to concentrate on its technology businesses, such as Westlaw — a move Loislaw also believes may be a sign that its product is beginning to grab market share from these larger competitors.

Thomson, of course, once owned the Northwest Arkansas Times in Fayetteville.