This article was displayed on the ChosunBiz MoneyMove (MM) site at 4:47 p.m. on Apr. 28, 2026.
Centroid Investment Partners (hereafter Centroid), a domestic private equity fund (PEF) manager, has built and is operating its own knowledge platform that applies artificial intelligence (AI) to investment review and post-management tasks. The structure processes deal-related documents and portfolio company materials, which are sensitive to security, on internal servers, and has AI connect accumulated investment review materials, financial models, contracts, and operating metrics by context to support risk checks and even report drafting.
According to the investment banking (IB) industry on the 28th, Centroid established an in-house AI and data department in 2023 and has been operating its proprietary AI platform "NEXUS" and AI agent "James." The team is led by Director General Song Byung-chae, who carried out AX projects at Hyundai Steel and LG Uplus, and researcher Lee Yoon-jae, who worked in the United States on full-stack (developing both the user interface and servers and databases) development and AI modeling.
The development team first examined which items an investment professional checks first upon receiving an information memorandum (IM) and which past materials are revisited ahead of negotiations for a stock purchase agreement (SPA). Based on this, they designed NEXUS. NEXUS is a platform that connects Centroid's accumulated investment review materials, financial models, and contracts to enable data search and analysis. It reuses materials accumulated during past deals and portfolio management in ways suited to the situation.
In the early stages, errors occurred such as missing key issues in SPA drafts spanning dozens of pages or misreading numbers in IMs, but since the second half of last year, Centroid said the problems have improved as the AI model's performance has advanced and usage examples have accumulated. It is now taking a step further by developing a patent and technology review tool. Using public data from the Korean Intellectual Property Office, the tool supports assessments of a corporation's technology value.
Centroid said it has been able to save up to 90% of the time required for investment review, due diligence preparation, report drafting, and legal review through NEXUS and James. It added that search accuracy and answer reliability based on internal documents are above 95%.
Centroid is using its proprietary AI platform not only to streamline internal tasks but also to operate portfolio companies. It dispatched developers to portfolio company Solid ENG to build AI solutions needed for product lifecycle management (PLM). It is using AI for tasks such as parts and drawing searches and reviews of purchase unit prices.
Centroid said it is advancing its AI platform by re-accumulating in NEXUS the materials generated during investment review, due diligence, and contracting. The idea is to recycle experience gained in individual deals into the next investments and portfolio management.