The PE AI playbook: Solena at the core, built out as you need it.
How we ramp AI at a private equity firm and across its portfolio, drawn from Soligence engagements. Solena at the core: the base layer and the Customer & Deal Intelligence module in production today, available as an annual subscription after a conversation and a demo. Further modules only where the firm needs them, with our AI Factory, the senior engineering team and agent workflows behind every custom system we ship, filling the gaps a module does not cover after a paid discovery. Your team's AI capability is built the whole way through.
Five stages, each one paying for the next.
The order matters: discovery tells us what the firm actually needs, the Solena base layer gives every later stage something to read from, and modules and custom builds are added only against a measured need.
1. Discovery
Two to four weeks with the deal team, IR, finance, and compliance. We map where the hours go (data rooms, IC memos, LP reporting, portfolio monitoring, fund ops), what systems and data exist, and what the information barriers and audit requirements are. The output is a readout, a written report, and proposed next steps with a priced proposal: where Solena fits, which further modules the firm is likely to need, and what AI Factory should build. Across the portfolio, the same discovery spends an hour with the leadership team at each of 5 to 10 portfolio companies, names the top three AI opportunities at each with a high-level reason why, and picks the one to three to act on first across the portfolio by likely EBITDA impact. Credited in full toward project work that begins within 60 days. A firm that only wants Solena can skip discovery: a conversation, a demo, signing, then implementation and setup.
Measure: the opportunities to act on first, each priced with the result it targets and when you can expect to see results, agreed before anything is built. How discovery works →
2. Set up Solena: the base layer and Customer & Deal Intelligence
The base layer is the semantic layer over the firm's knowledge: customers, deals, LPs, documents, conversations, and operating data, connected and queryable in the context of the work. On top of it, the Customer & Deal Intelligence module, the first Solena module in production: agents do the data capture, new deals are matched to the LPs most likely to fund them, and deal and LP briefs are drafted for review. An annual subscription hosted by Soligence, tuned to the firm's deal process, LP cadence, and controls.
Measure: annual software spend, brief preparation time, share of deal flow captured without manual entry. Case study →
3. Assess whether further modules are needed
With the base layer live, the next modules become a question of evidence, not a roadmap. Deal Execution (data room first read, red-flag memo with citations, first-draft IC memo the deal team verifies) and PortCo Health (board packs read every quarter, covenant headroom and KPI drift flagged as they move) are planned; we implement them where the firm's deal volume and portfolio make the case. Work needed ahead of a planned module is scoped separately.
Measure: hours from data room open to first-read memo; exceptions caught before the board meeting. The Solena modules →
4. Fill the gaps with the AI Factory
Every firm has work no module covers: LP reporting and DDQ assembly, fund finance exception handling, research and memo production on the firm's own materials, and inside the portfolio, the AI workstream in a portco's 100-day plan. Our AI Factory, the senior engineering team and agent workflows behind every custom system we ship, builds these to work alongside Solena and hands the custom builds to your team with documentation, training, and governance.
Measure: the operating metric each workflow was scoped to; nothing ships without one. Working with the fund →
5. Build the firm's own AI capability, all the way through
This is not a final step; it runs alongside the other four. Deal teams and operating partners trained on the workflows they will actually use (delivered through Soligence Elevate), governance and review gates the compliance owner signs off on, and a living AI policy that answers the LP diligence question: what the firm uses, where data goes, how information barriers and MNPI are handled, how outputs are reviewed. By the time the last module is live, the firm’s team uses it with confidence and governs it.
Measure: adoption by the people the workflow was built for; time to answer an LP diligence request on AI. Soligence Elevate →
Three things we tell firms not to do first.
Don't start with the investment thesis
Your edge in sourcing and underwriting is the firm's IP. AI pays back fastest on the assembly work around it, and that is where we focus. The investment process stays yours.
Don't buy a chatbot for the firm
A general assistant with no access to the firm's data, deal history, or controls produces confident text and no operating leverage. Every step above is wired into a system of record.
Don't roll out to ten portcos at once
Prove one workstream in one portco against a baseline, document it, then export the pattern. Portfolio-wide mandates without a measured first result stall at the second board meeting.
Walk through the playbook against your firm.
Tell us where your firm or portfolio is today and where the hours go. On the intro call we'll map these five stages to your situation and tell you honestly whether to start with discovery now or wait.
Intro call
30 to 45 minutes. You describe the bottleneck; we tell you honestly whether AI is the right lever and what discovery would cover. No slide deck, just a working conversation.
Discovery
Two to four weeks. We interview your team and review the workflows, data, and controls, then deliver a readout, a written report on where AI can help, and a priced proposal: for each project, its cost, the result it targets, how you’ll measure it, and when you can expect to see results. Starts at $5K, credited in full toward project work that begins within 60 days.
Project work
Custom software and modernization by our AI Factory, the senior engineering team and agent workflows behind every custom system we ship. Structured as a fixed-scope sprint, a multi-phase build, an ongoing operations partnership, or fractional AI leadership.
Most AI Factory engagements follow this pattern. Solena is an annual subscription with its own path: a conversation, a demo, signing, then implementation and setup. See how we work.