Latest news with #Pentland
Yahoo
14-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Adobe Appoints Louise Pentland as Chief Legal Officer
SAN JOSE, Calif., May 14, 2025--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Adobe (Nasdaq:ADBE) today announced the appointment of Louise Pentland as Chief Legal Officer and Executive Vice President. Pentland will report directly to Chair and CEO Shantanu Narayen and will lead the Legal and Government Relations team responsible for overseeing global legal and policy matters. Pentland is a technology industry veteran with deep experience as chief legal officer at several global companies. She brings a combination of expertise in corporate transactions, litigation, M&A integration and compliance, and has a proven track record of sparking change in complex organizations. "We are excited to welcome Louise Pentland to Adobe's leadership team," said Shantanu Narayen, Chair and CEO, Adobe. "Louise's decades of experience driving transformations at global companies and leading cutting-edge legal organizations make her well suited to help drive Adobe's continued growth." Pentland joins Adobe from Roku, where she served as Senior Vice President and General Counsel, leading regulatory, compliance and corporate governance. Pentland was previously Executive Vice President and Chief Counsel for Disney Experiences and Products, overseeing all legal and regulatory matters for the segment's businesses, including global theme park destinations, cruise operations, global consumer products operations and e-commerce platforms. Before Disney, Pentland served as Chief Legal Officer at PayPal and Nokia, where she managed corporate transactions, complex litigation, ecosystem partnerships, government relations and Environmental, Social and Governance strategies on a global scale. Pentland holds an LLB from Northumbria University in Newcastle-upon-Tyne, England. About Adobe Adobe is changing the world through personalized digital experiences. For more information, visit View source version on Contacts Ashley LevineAdobeadobepr@ Sign in to access your portfolio
Business Wire
14-05-2025
- Business
- Business Wire
Adobe Appoints Louise Pentland as Chief Legal Officer
SAN JOSE, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Adobe (Nasdaq:ADBE) today announced the appointment of Louise Pentland as Chief Legal Officer and Executive Vice President. Pentland will report directly to Chair and CEO Shantanu Narayen and will lead the Legal and Government Relations team responsible for overseeing global legal and policy matters. Pentland is a technology industry veteran with deep experience as chief legal officer at several global companies. She brings a combination of expertise in corporate transactions, litigation, M&A integration and compliance, and has a proven track record of sparking change in complex organizations. 'We are excited to welcome Louise Pentland to Adobe's leadership team,' said Shantanu Narayen, Chair and CEO, Adobe. 'Louise's decades of experience driving transformations at global companies and leading cutting-edge legal organizations make her well suited to help drive Adobe's continued growth.' Pentland joins Adobe from Roku, where she served as Senior Vice President and General Counsel, leading regulatory, compliance and corporate governance. Pentland was previously Executive Vice President and Chief Counsel for Disney Experiences and Products, overseeing all legal and regulatory matters for the segment's businesses, including global theme park destinations, cruise operations, global consumer products operations and e-commerce platforms. Before Disney, Pentland served as Chief Legal Officer at PayPal and Nokia, where she managed corporate transactions, complex litigation, ecosystem partnerships, government relations and Environmental, Social and Governance strategies on a global scale. Pentland holds an LLB from Northumbria University in Newcastle-upon-Tyne, England. About Adobe Adobe is changing the world through personalized digital experiences. For more information, visit
Yahoo
05-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Roseanne Barr Had Surprise Reaction to ‘The Conners' Finale
Roseanne Barr had no idea The Conners ended its run on ABC, her son has revealed. The spinoff sitcom wrapped its seventh and final season on April 23, seven years after Barr parted ways from the original Roseanne series amid a racist tweet scandal. Barr's son, Jake Pentland, told TMZ that his mom didn't know The Conners ended because she never paid attention to the show. He also clarified that while Barr and the rest of their family never watched an episode of the spinoff, they were happy to learn that the crew members were able to continue to work for years despite Barr's exit. Pentland had a slightly shadier take when talking to Us Weekly. When asked about the end of The Conners, he told the outlet, 'We don't care about cheap knockoffs. We support the real brands. We only pay attention to things that matter to the American people.' Barr's character, Roseanne Conner, was killed off of the Roseanne series in 2018, and the spinoff launched later that year. The Conners series finale addressed the character's death heavily, with one scene that featured the entire cast at Roseanne's gravesite saying their goodbyes. No flashback footage of Barr was shown at all as the show ended its run. In an interview with The New York Post, producer Bruce Rasmussen credited Barr with 'graciously' stepping away from the series she helped create, helping to save hundreds of jobs by allowing The Conners spinoff to be greenlit. Rasmussen noted that he had not talked to Barr since 2018. Barr has been living in Texas and co-hosts a podcast with her son. Pentland hinted that his mom could make a return to acting at some point. He told Us Weekly that Barr has been back to writing scripts. 'You might just see her on TV again soon,' he said. 'You never know.''
Forbes
03-05-2025
- Business
- Forbes
What Are Digital Defense AI Agents?
We're in the new world of agentic AI, which means that everyone's looking at how to use AI agents to their advantage. In a certain simplistic sense, that means that companies are looking to use AI agents to sell, while governments are trying to use AI agents to do - whatever they are used to doing. Some consumer advocates argue that individual people who are so often being targeted by businesses and government activities need their own AI agents to defend them. When Alex 'Sandy' Pentland took the stage at this year's Imagination in Action event, he was talking about specifically this type of thing. 'They're going to try and hack me, do bad things to me,' he said of those ubiquitous agents controlled by business, government or big interest parties. 'They are going to twist my mind around politics, all of those things. And my answer to this is I need an AI agent to defend me. I need something who's on my side who can help me navigate returning things or avoiding scams, or all that whole sort of thing.' The idea that Pentland describes is that your AI agent addresses all of that other agent activity that's aimed at you, and intervenes on your behalf. The idea of a personal 'digital defender' in the form of an AI agent is not very widely talked about on the web. Pentland's video is up there, but you don't see much about the specific type of project in research papers, or on corporate sites, or even at Consumer Reports (more on this later). In a way, it's like having a public defender in court. There's a legal effort against you, so you need your own advocacy to represent you on your side. Although some might call these attorneys 'public pretenders' due to underpayment, short staffing, or other problems, hopefully the AI agent is more effective in a global sense. It's also sort of like consumer reporting – Pentland mentioned how Consumer Reports has been doing this kind of work for 80 years with polls and other tools. 'This is why we have seat belts in cars,' he said. 'At Consumer Reports, what they do is, they pull all their people, they do tests and things like that to find good products. That's what I want, is, I want somebody who's on my side that way.' Another sort of similar idea is cybersecurity agents who are created by a company called Twine that are intended to protect people from cyberattacks. But all that aside, Pentland's idea is still in its infancy. In fact, one of the most interesting parts of his presentation was when he talked about all of these business people making their way into one room to talk about personal AI defense agents. 'We had C-level representation, the head of AI products for every single major AI producer, show up on one week's notice,' he explained. 'We also had all the payers show up … people (who handle) credit cards, etc. We had all the systems guys show up. Now (you're in a) little room with more C-level people than you've ever seen in your entire life. Very busy people who showed up on one week's notice.' It's largely liability, he suggested, that brought them to the table 'If they're going to deploy these things, and they're going to be interacting with you, they had better not cheat, they'd better not be biased, or scam you,' he said. 'They have a lot of liability, legal liability, as well as reputational liability. They have to be fair in helping you do things, otherwise they're going to end up in class action courts. That's what they wanted. They wanted someone to build a standard best practice personal agent.' He mentioned a couple of caveats: the agentic system has to undergo legal testing. Ideally, it should be hosted in academia to show impartiality. While best practices are good, he said, companies and other parties really want a standard, because a standard is bulletproof. Pentland also talked about a sort of digital populism that's appealing to those who feel like there's strength in numbers. 'You're just you,' he said. 'But if there were a million yous, or 10 million yous, all (of them) trying to get a good deal, avoid scams, fill out that legal form, you could actually have Ais that are competitive with the best results. So that solves the own, your own data problem (pretty well).' In response to questions, Pentland went over some advice for those who are just starting their careers now. Part of it had to do with solving big questions around how these defense agents will work. 'How do I know what's good for me, and what I want?' he asked, raising some of the essential questions of how an AI agent can target its efforts correctly, according to the user's preference and welfare. He also brought up questions around how to put agents together, to build toward what he called a 'network effect' that magnifies what a connected system of agents can do. He also talked about another kind of game theory where it's easy to upset the apple cart with just a small adjustment. Essentially, Pentland argued, a bad actor can easily throw a system out of balance by being 'just a little edgy,' by making small changes that lead to a domino effect that can be detrimental. He used the example of a traffic jam, which starts off as just one car in dense traffic changing its behavior. This type of game theory, he asserted, has to be factored into how we create our digital defense agent networks. With all of this in mind, it's probably a good idea to think about building those digital defense agents. They might not be perfect right away, but they might be the defense that we need against an emerging army of hackers utilizing some of the most potent technologies we've ever seen. The idea also feeds back into the whole debate about open source and closed source models, and when tools should be published for all the world to use. It's imperative to keep a lid on the types of bad actors that could otherwise jeopardize systems. In the cryptocurrency days, we had the notion of a 51% attack, where as soon as somebody held more than half of a given blockchain item, they had full control, with no exceptions. The solution to our AI liability might be something like this. Look for this type of research to continue.
Fashion United
24-04-2025
- Business
- Fashion United
Lacoste eyes controlling stake in joint venture with Pentland
Lacoste is understood to be circling the acquisition of a controlling stake in its joint venture company set up with Pentland Group. If the deal proceeds, Lacoste intends to buy Pentland's 50 percent stake in Pentland Chaussures Ltd, for which the group currently serves as a Lacoste licensee. According to FashionNetwork, which initially reported the news, competition authorities in France are currently assessing the deal, with a decision said to be made 'soon'. If approved, the partnership between the British sportswear conglomerate and French premium brand will come to an end. The duo first established the joint venture back in 2018 to oversee the operations of Lacoste's footwear business. It cemented what was already a long-standing partnership between Lacoste and Pentland, which had first teamed up in 1991. Now, however, Lacoste is on a path of repositioning itself as a more high-end sportswear player. This has repeatedly been underlined by CEO Thierry Guibert, who had already told the Financial Times back in January of the brand's intention to reclaim its licenses over shoes, leather goods and under garments to further help support ambitious growth plans. Ultimately, Guibert is hoping to increase the brand's annual sales to four billion euros, with a plan that particularly focuses on the US market, where he has set out to double sales from 400 million euros. FashionUnited has contacted Pentland and Lacoste with requests to comment.
