APOLLO GLOBAL IS NOW CHECKING EVERY SOFTWARE DEAL FOR AI KILL RISK — WALL STREET’S BIGGEST BET JUST GOT MORE NERVOUS Apollo Global Management, one of the largest private equity firms on earth with more than $700 billion in assets, has built a formal framework to screen every software investment it considers for the risk that AI will destroy it. The firm divides software into 12 to 14 categories and ranks each one by its susceptibility to artificial intelligence disruption before any deal moves forward. According to Rob Bittencourt, Apollo’s head of thematic investing, the same process has been applied retroactively to the firm’s existing portfolio. Positions considered at high risk of AI disruption are candidates for exit. The stakes are enormous. Software historically made up about ten percent of global private equity buyout volume. That figure has swelled to roughly 40 percent over the past decade, often at high valuations and loaded with debt. If AI can replace the functionality of a software company with a model and an API call, the underlying business case for that investment collapses. Apollo’s response has been to redirect toward what it calls HALO assets: heavy asset, low obsolescence businesses less vulnerable to being automated away. Think pipelines, data centers, and physical infrastructure rather than SaaS. This is what the AI reckoning looks like from the boardrooms of finance: quiet, systematic, and methodical. Keywords: Apollo Global AI risk, private equity AI disruption, software investment risk, HALO assets