# Persto

> Persto is software you install on your own servers. It turns your organization’s files into a private AI model that runs fully offline and plugs into the tools you already use. Persto, your AI smith, asks plain-language questions in three short stages; you answer, he does the machine learning. In development. Early access is open to a small number of organizations.

Persto is a product in development by Persto LLC. It has no customers, certifications (such as FedRAMP, SOC 2, HIPAA or CMMC) or partnerships to report yet. Any numbers shown on the website are illustrative examples, not real results.

Persto has a persona: Persto, a blacksmith in a black forging helmet who “forges” your model. In the product, he is the one asking you the questions in plain language; you answer, and he does the machine learning.

## The problem

The documents worth learning from are the ones you can’t send out.

- **Cloud AI is off the table.** Policies, contracts, manuals and case files often can’t leave your network, by regulation or by choice.
- **Building your own takes specialists.** Preparing data, training and evaluating a model is work for a machine learning team that most organizations don’t have.

Persto lets the people who know the documents build the model themselves, on hardware you control.

## How it works

Upload your files (any mix of documents, spreadsheets, slides, text and email exports), then answer plain-language questions in three stages. Persto does the machine learning in between.

1. **Stage 1: your data.** Persto produces a Data X-ray of the whole collection and asks only the questions it cannot decide on its own (what the documents are about, their format, and what is wrong with them), each with a recommended answer. It then cleans the documents and converts them into one standard structure.
2. **Stage 2: your goals.** Who will use the model, how it should write, whether to cite sources, and what to do when it is unsure. Each answer becomes a training setting. Persto then generates training examples from your documents, verifies each against its source, and fine-tunes a small open model on your own hardware.
3. **Stage 3: your sign-off.** Review sample answers and approve or improve them. Persto retrains on your corrections. With Persto Private you get a single model file you own, running on your infrastructure behind a standard API; with Persto Hosted you get a private endpoint.

### It understands your data before it trains on it

Stage 1 is about your documents. Persto reads every file, whatever the format, shows you what it found, and asks about anything it can’t decide on its own. Then it cleans everything up: duplicates and junk removed, conflicts resolved, sensitive details handled, all in one standard format ready for training.

- **Data X-ray.** A report on the whole collection: what it’s about, main topics, document types, terminology and undefined acronyms, duplicates and versions, possible contradictions, sensitive information, blank or unreadable pages, and how the documents are structured.
- **Questions about your data.** Only the ones that matter, each with a recommended answer. Which version is current? What does this acronym mean? Remove, mask or keep the sensitive information?
- **One clean, standard structure.** Persto removes duplicates, junk pages and repeated headers, applies your answers, and converts everything into one consistent format ready for training.

### It becomes your model

Stage 2 steers the training and Stage 3 is your sign-off. In between, Persto builds and checks everything itself.

- **Questions about your goals.** Who will use it, how it should write, whether to cite sources, what to do when it isn’t sure. Each answer becomes a training setting. No hyperparameters.
- **Verified training, on a small open model.** Persto writes training examples from your documents, checks every one against its source, and fine-tunes a small open model on them, on your own hardware.
- **You approve it, then it runs offline.** Review sample answers and approve or improve them. Persto retrains on your corrections, then packages the model to run fully offline.

## Supported data

File types: PDF, DOCX, XLSX, CSV, PPTX, TXT, MD, HTML, JSON, EML. Mixed collections are converted into one standard structure before training.

## Inside your walls

Persto is software you install on infrastructure you control. Training and the finished model run inside your walls, and the model belongs to you. If you’d rather not run it yourself, Persto can train and host it for you instead.

- **Air-gapped.** For networks physically cut off from the internet. Installed and updated offline, from approved media.
- **On-premises.** On servers in your own building, behind your existing firewall and access controls. Designed for modest hardware.
- **Private cloud.** In your own cloud account (commercial or government), walled off from everyone else, in the region you choose.

### Two ways to use Persto

- **Persto Private: Install it. Everything stays inside.** (The core product · required for air-gapped and regulated data). Software you install on your own servers or private cloud. Training and the finished model both run on your hardware. Nothing leaves your environment, and the model is a file you own.
- **Persto Hosted: We train it. You call it.** (For teams without GPUs or servers to spare). Upload your files and answer the same three stages. Persto trains your model on its own infrastructure. You get a private endpoint to call from your apps.

Either way, your model speaks a standard API, so it plugs into what you already use: internal tools, chat apps, help desks and your own code.

- **Your data stays yours.** With Persto Private, documents never leave your environment.
- **No outside calls.** Persto Private has no telemetry and no phoning home. Built to work unplugged.
- **Every step is logged.** An audit trail of ingestion, cleanup, your decisions and every training run.
- **You own the weights.** With Persto Private, the model is a file you keep, independent of any subscription.

These are design principles for a product in development. Persto does not hold certifications such as FedRAMP, SOC 2, HIPAA or CMMC.

## Uploading files to a chatbot, compared with owning a model

| | Chatbot with uploaded files | Persto |
|---|---|---|
| Works offline and air-gapped | No | Yes |
| Learns your terminology and formats | Partly | Yes |
| Behaves the same way every time | Partly | Yes |
| Cites its sources | Partly | Yes |
| Proves accuracy on your own questions | No | Yes |
| You own the model | No | Yes |
| No machine learning expertise needed | Yes | Yes |

Typical general-purpose chatbot tools, compared with Persto’s design goals. Persto is in development.

## Who it is for

- **Defense and government contractors.** Draft responses from technical manuals and contract requirements on an air-gapped network.
- **Healthcare.** Answer staff questions from clinical policies and procedures, with citations, inside your network.
- **Finance.** Answer compliance questions from your own policies, offline.
- **Legal.** Draft clauses in your firm’s style from your own precedents and playbooks.
- **Critical infrastructure.** Help technicians find the right procedure in maintenance manuals and safety standards.

## Who is building Persto

Aaron Pinto, Founder & CEO. LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/aaron-pinto

- **AI/ML engineer at a major defense contractor.** Builds agentic AI systems used by 47,000+ employees.
- **Amazon (Alexa), at HQ2 from age 18.** Built an AI agent on AWS Bedrock and a retrieval pipeline over 8,000+ pages of internal docs; cut bug triage time 70%.
- **Fine-tunes models hands-on.** Trained a Qwen model with LoRA for an AI portfolio recruiters can talk to.
- **Hackathon winner.** ROTTED: a Rust vector-search engine for 50 GB document uploads.
- **B.S. Computer Science,** Western Governors University, 4.0 GPA (December 2026).

> I kept watching teams try to build AI agents for their work, and they kept failing. An agent follows your rules only as long as its instructions hold, and under pressure they don’t.
>
> Ask ChatGPT for something dangerous and it refuses. That refusal isn’t a line in a prompt; it was trained into the model. That’s the difference Persto is built on: your knowledge and your rules, trained into a model you own, instead of written into instructions and hoped for.

## FAQ

### Is Persto available yet?

Not yet. Persto is in development, and we’re opening it to a small group of early-access organizations first. Join the list and we’ll be in touch as places open.

### Does my data leave my environment?

Not with Persto Private. It’s software you install on your own infrastructure (air-gapped, on-premises or in your private cloud), and training and the model both run there. With Persto Hosted, you choose to send your files to Persto for training and call the model through a private endpoint. Regulated and air-gapped teams should use Private.

### Does it work with the systems we already have?

Yes. Your model is served through a standard API, so your internal tools, chat apps, help desk and your own code can call it, whether it runs on your servers (Private) or on Persto’s endpoint (Hosted).

### Do I need machine learning experience?

No. Persto asks plain-language questions about your data and your goals and turns the answers into training decisions. Knowing your documents is the expertise that matters.

### What kinds of data does it work with?

All the common ones: PDFs, Word documents, Excel spreadsheets and CSVs, PowerPoint decks, plain text and Markdown, web pages and wiki exports, JSON, and email exports. Mix them freely; Persto converts everything into one standard structure before training. If your data lives in a format we haven’t listed, tell us on the form.

### Do I need my own GPUs?

Only for Persto Private, where training runs on your hardware. Persto is being designed for ordinary servers rather than large GPU clusters, and we’ll share specific requirements with early-access participants. With Persto Hosted, you don’t need any: we train and serve the model for you.

### What do I get at the end?

With Persto Private, a single model file that you own (the trained model, your settings and an audit log of how it was built), running on your infrastructure behind a standard API. With Persto Hosted, a private endpoint your apps can call. Either way, you get the same three stages and the same testing on your own questions.

### What does a design partner do?

Design partners work with us during development: sharing requirements, trying early builds in their own environment, and shaping the roadmap. Tick the box on the form if you’re interested.

## Links

- [Website](https://persto.dev/): overview, interactive product walkthrough, waitlist
- [Join the waitlist](https://persto.dev/#join): email only
- [Request early access or become a design partner](https://persto.dev/#early-access)
- [Privacy notice](https://persto.dev/privacy)
- Contact: info@getpersto.com