Research Context: This work is a core component of the Presence Engine™ Living Thesis (DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.17280692). Neve (/nɛv/) is a presence-first, sovereignty-preserving stateful AI architecture. It operationalizes concepts such as presence, dignity-first interaction, and cognitive integrity as concrete engineering constraints rather than abstract values. These constraints are implemented through persistent identity via C2C continuity tokens, OCEAN-based dispositional scaffolding, governed proactivity with explicit override and cooldown logic, and a risk-scaled ethics layer that shapes refusal and escalation behavior. This technical report documents Neve’s current capabilities and limitations. A fourteen-benchmark evaluation suite validates persistent identity, signal sensitivity, dispositional stability, proactive governance, and ethics escalation under controlled conditions. Stateful processing overhead remains in the low-millisecond range across multi-turn sessions. Long-term memory, referred to here as a governed memory surface, and human-subject outcome studies are explicitly scoped as future work. The objective of this release is to provide a reproducible architectural baseline for companion-grade, stateful AI systems that preserve user agency rather than optimize solely for engagement or task completion. Benchmarks: This report introduces Neve, a presence-first, sovereignty-preserving stateful AI architecture that prioritizes continuity over engagement, privacy over inference, and conversation over task execution. By combining persistent identity, consent-based memory, and governed proactivity with an ethics-scaled behavior layer, Neve offers a reproducible architectural baseline for companion-grade AI distinct from engagement-optimized systems. Keywords: stateful ai, autonomous agents, presence engine, governed proactivity, conversational sovereignty, cognitive integrity, ocean model, ethics layer, digital identity, session persistence