The AI Why with Liam Lawson

Everyone thinks the future of work means spending more time interacting with AI. Aaron Mitchell Finegold believes the opposite.

As Head of Product Marketing at Adobe, Aaron sits at the intersection of enterprise AI, agentic workflows, brand intelligence and the future of how work gets done. In this conversation with Liam Lawson, he explains why most companies are approaching AI adoption incorrectly, what an agentic content supply chain actually looks like, and why trust, judgment and human relationships may become even more valuable in an AI-first world.

Stories Covered This Week:

Why most companies are deploying AI agents the wrong way

What an agentic content supply chain actually looks like inside the enterprise

How Adobe is building systems that combine humans and AI agents

Why generative AI without guardrails can damage brand integrity

The difference between work that should be done by humans versus agents

How enterprises are turning brand knowledge into AI-readable intelligence

Why trust matters for both humans and AI systems

The personality traits that will thrive in an AI-driven workplace

Aaron's vision for the future of work and why it may involve less interaction with machines than people expect

Episode Timestamps:

00:00 Intro and Aaron's background

03:01 Hands-on experience building with AI

04:41 The biggest misconception about generative AI

05:38 What an agentic content supply chain looks like

07:30 When should AI agents replace humans?

08:40 How Adobe's Brand Intelligence works

10:44 Where AI starts and human creativity ends

12:09 Aaron's vision for the future of work

13:41 What trust means for humans and AI agents

16:34 Reliability, AI systems and enterprise adoption

19:34 The personality traits that will thrive in the AI era

21:38 Why do you do what you do?

Connect with Aaron on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/finegold/

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Anthropic is preparing for public markets. Europe is pushing to reduce its reliance on American tech. And CNN just filed a copyright lawsuit against Perplexity.

This week, Anthropic files confidential paperwork for an IPO in one of the biggest milestones yet for the AI industry, Europe unveils a tech sovereignty plan to reduce its dependence on American technology, CNN sues Perplexity over the alleged redistribution of more than 17,000 copyrighted stories, Morgan Stanley opens its platform to external AI agents using MCP, and Microsoft teams up with Mayo Clinic to build an AI model for healthcare.

If you are a founder, operator or executive trying to keep up with AI, this is your weekly five minute briefing.

Stories Covered This Week:

Anthropic files confidential paperwork for an IPO, with OpenAI expected to follow soon

Europe unveils a tech sovereignty plan to build out data centers, revive its chip industry and buy more from European suppliers

CNN sues Perplexity over the alleged use of more than 17,000 copyrighted stories, photos and videos

Morgan Stanley becomes one of the first major Wall Street banks to open its platform to external AI agents via MCP

Microsoft and Mayo Clinic partner to build an AI model designed specifically for healthcare

Episode Timestamps:

00:00 Intro
00:17 Anthropic files to go public
01:17 Europe pushes for tech sovereignty
02:28 CNN sues Perplexity
03:23 Morgan Stanley opens up to AI agents
04:22 Microsoft and Mayo Clinic build a healthcare AI

05:11 Outro

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In the AI race, some of Adobe's closest partners are also its biggest competitors. So how does it decide who to work with?

Sahil Gupta is the Senior Director of Partnerships at Adobe, where he leads technology partnerships with the biggest names in AI including OpenAI, Anthropic, Google Cloud and NVIDIA. In this episode Liam sits down with Sahil to break down how these partnerships actually come together, what Adobe announced at Adobe Summit, how you navigate working with a partner you also compete with, and what the future of work really looks like from someone sitting at the center of the AI ecosystem.

Topics covered:

How Adobe structures partnerships with OpenAI, Anthropic, Google and Microsoft and surfaces its agentic capabilities inside each

The NVIDIA partnership including 3D digital twins, agent governance and the next generation of Firefly models

How you co-innovate with a partner like Anthropic that also competes with you on design tools

The difference between working with a 30 year partner like IBM and a company only a few years old

Why Adobe brings over 30 models including startups like Runway into Firefly

What the future of work looks like and the radiology lesson from NVIDIA's Jensen Huang

Episode Timestamps:

00:00 Intro
00:36 Competing and co-innovating with partners
01:22 How Sahil kept ending up at the center of industry moments
03:01 What a Senior Director of Partnerships actually does
04:03 Where partnerships actually come from
06:24 What Adobe announced at Summit
07:40 The NVIDIA partnership explained
10:28 Navigating partnerships with companies you also compete with
12:06 Working with 30 year partners versus brand new ones
13:43 What partnerships Adobe is building toward next
15:23 Why everything comes back to customer experience
17:54 How Sahil ended up in partnerships
19:27 The future of work and the radiology lesson
22:15 Why do you do what you do

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Users are already pushing back on Google's new AI search update, DeepSeek just slashed AI model prices by up to 75 percent, and Robinhood is now testing AI agents that can trade stocks on your behalf.

This week, DuckDuckGo sees a sharp rise in installs as users look for alternatives to AI-heavy search, DeepSeek cuts prices on its V4 Pro models and escalates the AI pricing war, Apple announces a set of AI-powered accessibility features across its devices, Robinhood tests AI agents that can place trades for users, and Anthropic releases Opus 4.8 to everyone on any plan.

If you are a founder, operator or executive trying to keep up with AI, this is your weekly five-minute briefing every Tuesday.

Stories Covered This Week:

DuckDuckGo installs rise sharply as some users actively seek out AI free search experiences after Google's update

DeepSeek cuts V4 Pro model prices by up to 75 percent, intensifying the industry wide pricing battle

Apple announces AI powered accessibility features across iPhone, iPad, Mac and Vision Pro including eye tracking wheelchair control

Robinhood tests AI agents that can execute trades on behalf of users with built in safeguards and oversight

Anthropic releases Opus 4.8 to all plans with improved honesty, adjustable effort settings and new dynamic workflows in Claude Code

Episode Timestamps:

00:00 Intro
00:20 Users push back on Google AI search as DuckDuckGo installs rise
01:25 DeepSeek cuts model prices by up to 75%
02:13 Apple announces AI accessibility features across its devices
03:11 Robinhood tests AI agents that trade for you
04:18 Anthropic releases Opus 4.8 to everyone

05:32 Outro

Partner Links:

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Join the community: https://community.theaireport.ai/checkout/the-ai-report-welcome-gift?coupon_code=WRTH

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AI traffic to retail sites is up 393% year on year. A year ago, that traffic was underperforming every other marketing channel. Now it is outperforming all of them by 48%. And most businesses have no idea how to capitalise on it.

Vivek Pandya, the Director of Adobe Digital Insights, leads the team that analyses trends across trillions of data points to help enterprises understand where the digital economy is heading. In this episode, Liam sits down with Vivek to break down the biggest shift happening in consumer behavior right now, why generative engine optimisation is the most important opportunity since social media, and what businesses need to do today to stay visible as AI changes how people search and buy.

Topics covered:

Why AI traffic to retail sites is up 393% year on year, and what drove the shift

How consumer conversion through AI channels went from underperforming by 38% to outperforming by 48% in one year

Why a third of all content on the internet is not machine readable right now and what that means for your business

What generative engine optimisation is and why it matters more than SEO right now

The difference between how San Francisco thinks about AI adoption versus the rest of the world

Why data storytelling is still the most underrated skill in business

Episode Timestamps:

00:00 Intro
00:21 What is Adobe Digital Insights and what does Vivek do
01:12 A trillion data points
02:18 How the data is processed and what enterprises are asking for
03:47 The biggest AI trends right now
06:04 What changed in consumer behaviour
07:35 How to set your business up for AI search success
10:24 What the data does not tell you
12:53 Where does Vivek's trust in AI start and finish
14:03 What speaks to Vivek about his role
15:19 How the job influences how he thinks outside of work
17:53 Living in San Francisco and what you learn being close to the technology
19:47 Why do you do what you do

Connect with Vivek on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/vivekmpandya/

Partner links:

Upgrade your AI toolkit: https://www.theaireport.ai/ai-executive-pass

Subscribe to our free newsletter: https://newsletter.theaireport.ai/subscribe

Join the community: www.theaireport.ai/leaders-launch-guide

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