SOFIAH NICHOLE SALIVIO

News Editor

Cloudsmith has appointed Mark O’Connor as Chief Financial Officer and Dan Lascell as General Counsel, expanding the Belfast software supply chain security company’s executive team after its USD $72 million Series C funding round.

Both are moving into full-time roles after advising the company for several years. O’Connor worked with Cloudsmith’s finance organisation through its last three venture financings, while Lascell served as fractional General Counsel and helped shape its legal and governance structures.

The appointments come as Cloudsmith seeks to deepen ties with large corporate customers, including Fortune 500 and Global 2000 groups. More enterprises now rely on its software supply chain tools to secure and govern software artifacts used in development and distribution.

O’Connor is expected to oversee the company’s financial infrastructure as it works towards public market readiness. His remit includes establishing financial and procurement controls suited to a business operating at greater scale.

Before joining full time, he held senior finance roles at Bugcrowd, Tenfold, Appirio, Nuance Communications and BeVocal. His background spans venture-backed software businesses, acquisitions and listed companies.

Lascell will lead legal, compliance and commercial contracting. His work will focus on enterprise procurement requirements and internal governance as Cloudsmith expands among larger customers with more complex regulatory demands.

He previously held legal leadership roles at Appirio, Bugcrowd, Tercera, AmberPoint and webMethods. His experience in corporate development and international expansion, combined with his prior advisory work, gives him detailed knowledge of Cloudsmith’s commercial and compliance arrangements.

Growth push

The leadership changes follow Cloudsmith’s latest financing from TCV and Insight Partners. The USD $72 million Series C round provided fresh capital as the company scales operations around software artifact management and supply chain security.

Cloudsmith’s platform is used to store, secure and distribute software packages and other development assets across different environments. It says it supports more than 30 artifact formats and serves customers across sectors including banking, financial technology, telecoms, software and artificial intelligence.

In recent years, software supply chain security has become a growing priority for large organisations after attacks and compliance pressures exposed weaknesses in how code and software components move through development pipelines. Vendors in this market have sought to position themselves not just as infrastructure providers, but as trusted partners for governance, traceability and procurement oversight.

That backdrop helps explain the emphasis on finance, legal and internal controls in Cloudsmith’s latest hires. Both roles are central to reassuring larger customers that the company’s internal processes can withstand the same scrutiny applied to the software services it sells.

O’Connor highlighted that focus in comments on his appointment. “Our focus is on building Cloudsmith’s infrastructure for longevity,” said Mark O’Connor, Chief Financial Officer at Cloudsmith. “That means ensuring our financial controls and commercial rigor are up to audit-ready standards, while enabling our customer-facing teams to move fast and lead the market. That combination means customers can trust Cloudsmith as a mission-critical infrastructure partner.”

Lascell also linked his role to customer expectations around security, compliance and long-term dependability. “Cloudsmith’s platform is built on trust, providing secure artifacts, provable provenance, and policy-driven governance. Our internal legal and compliance posture reflect that same commitment,” said Dan Lascell, General Counsel at Cloudsmith. “Our job is to scale the legal and risk frameworks to ensure Cloudsmith is a dependable long-term partner for large enterprise customers with complex regulatory and legal obligations.”

Executive build-out

The additions mark a further expansion of the senior team under Chief Executive Officer Glenn Weinstein. As software companies move beyond the early venture stage, hiring permanent finance and legal leaders often signals a shift towards tighter operating discipline, more formal governance and preparation for broader capital markets options.

Weinstein said the appointments are part of meeting customer expectations across the business. “Mark and Dan are important additions to our leadership team,” said Glenn Weinstein, Chief Executive Officer at Cloudsmith. “Enterprise customers rely on Cloudsmith as a dependable partner they can trust at every level, including the platform, their commercial relationship with Cloudsmith, and our internal governance. Mark and Dan will help ensure we meet the highest standards for financial rigor and legal credibility.”

SOFIAH NICHOLE SALIVIO

News Editor

Facewatch is expanding its live facial recognition business into the UK pharmacy sector, citing rising concern about theft and abuse in pharmacies.

It is preparing to launch Facewatch PharmacyProtect for pharmacy operators dealing with crime linked to medicines, repeat offending and threats to staff. The system is aimed at pharmacies that combine healthcare services with a retail presence on the high street.

The launch comes as pharmacy bodies warn of worsening conditions for frontline teams. The National Pharmacy Association has reported a rise in theft, aggression and threats against pharmacy staff, and says police and NHS responses are often inadequate.

Pharmacies face a different risk profile from other retailers because they store prescription and over-the-counter medicines and often operate in busy locations with limited security measures. Facewatch argues this can leave staff more exposed to confrontation and organised theft.

Its technology is already used across other parts of retail. Facewatch says it acts as a data controller under UK GDPR and sends real-time alerts to staff when a person previously linked to criminal behaviour enters a participating store.

More than 125 retailers using the system operate thousands of stores across the UK, according to the business. It says the technology has helped cut repeat offending by up to 70% and has been adopted by Budgens, Frasers Group, Flannels, Home Bargains, Sainsbury’s and Sports Direct, as well as garden centres and charity shops.

Facewatch also says its system generated more than 500,000 real-time alerts involving known offenders in 2025. It linked that figure to wider pressure on retail workers, citing British Retail Consortium data showing 1,600 incidents of abuse and violence against shop workers each day.

Sector pressure

Community pharmacies have become an increasingly visible part of frontline healthcare, offering services from dispensing medicines to handling patient queries and minor illness support. That accessibility can also make them vulnerable to theft, intimidation and repeat visits by offenders.

Facewatch says PharmacyProtect is being developed with pharmacy operators rather than simply adapted from general retail settings. It is seeking input from pharmacy groups, independent operators and trade bodies as it shapes the product for the sector.

The move suggests Facewatch sees an opening beyond supermarkets and fashion chains, where retailers have been investing more heavily in tools to identify repeat offenders and protect staff. The pharmacy market adds another layer of sensitivity because of its mix of healthcare delivery, controlled medicines and public access.

Nick Fisher, Chief Executive Officer at Facewatch, said the company believes the problem is becoming more severe. “Community pharmacies are on the frontline of both healthcare delivery and retail crime, particularly the rise in organised crime, which we have seen rise sharply in recent years in the wider retail sector. What we are bringing to the pharmacy sector is not new; it is a proven system that is already helping retailers across the UK identify repeat offenders, prevent crime and protect staff before incidents escalate. We want to work with the sector to better understand its specific needs, and offering open access to a demonstration of how the technology works is a vital part of that process.”

The move also highlights how facial recognition is spreading into more specialised areas of physical retail as businesses look for ways to respond to persistent offending. For pharmacies, the issue is not only shoplifting but also the risk of staff abuse in settings where employees may be dealing with prescriptions, stock controls and vulnerable customers at the same time.

Facewatch says the pharmacy version of its system is intended to support operators facing those pressures while staying within UK data protection rules. The technology will trigger alerts about known offenders and notify staff immediately when those individuals enter a protected site.

Its customer base suggests the business has already moved beyond large grocery and fashion chains into other sectors that have seen a rise in theft. The inclusion of charity shops and garden centres among users points to how crime prevention spending is widening as offending spreads to stores once seen as lower risk.

For pharmacy operators, the decision to adopt such tools is likely to depend on whether they see them as proportionate, effective and workable in an environment that combines healthcare, customer service and retail. Facewatch says it wants to build the product with direct sector input rather than offer a standard retail model.

SOFIAH NICHOLE SALIVIO

News Editor

Ripjar has published research showing that 58% of banks still rely on manual adverse media searches, even though 93% of financial services leaders view adverse media screening as critical.

The findings highlight a gap between how financial institutions rate adverse media screening and how widely they use it. While 77% of respondents said their organisations conduct adverse media screening, more than a fifth do not despite the importance attached to the practice.

The survey covered 400 senior decision-makers in financial services across the UK, US, France and Germany. All were C-suite or director-level executives with responsibility for, or significant authority over, customer screening, anti-money laundering or financial crime.

Manual processes remain common across the markets surveyed, with 58% of institutions still using manual internet searches as part of their adverse media process. In the US, that figure rises to 70%.

At the same time, 28% of financial institutions have not yet adopted continuous monitoring. Firms also want broader, more connected screening systems, with 96% of leaders saying they want adverse media screening combined with sanctions, politically exposed persons and watchlists on a single platform.

Spending plans suggest firms are trying to close that gap. According to the research, 90% of respondents plan to increase investment in adverse media screening over the next year.

The data also points to limits in current artificial intelligence adoption. While 79% of respondents reported investment in AI, only 28% said it had been fully deployed, leaving what Ripjar described as a 51% gap between investment and implementation.

Enforcement pressure

The findings come against a backdrop of rising anti-money laundering enforcement costs for the banking sector. Financial institutions have paid more than USD $69 billion in AML enforcement actions globally since the financial crisis.

Penalties against banks worldwide rose 522% year on year in 2024 to USD $3.65 billion. Recent enforcement cases show that adverse media signals often appear well before penalties are imposed.

Adverse media screening is used by banks and other financial institutions to identify negative news and public information linked to customers, counterparties or other entities. It forms part of broader controls designed to detect money laundering, sanctions breaches and reputational risk.

The study also found differences between markets, although the release highlighted the US figure most clearly. Covering four major financial markets, the results pointed to uneven readiness among institutions to move from fragmented manual checks to more systematic monitoring.

Matt Mills, Chief Executive Officer of Ripjar, said: “There’s a clear direction of travel in financial institutions when it comes to adverse media. With so many decision-makers viewing it as critical, adverse media screening is the first line of defence against crime and reputation risk. But what the research also reveals is that there are big differences across countries, and many are unprepared to run it in the way today’s market demands: systematically and at scale. Some of the best banks in the world are already doing this but it’s clear that the rest of the market needs to unify adverse media with sanctions, watchlists and PEPs screening if financial institutions are to adapt successfully to the new risk landscape.”

Founded in 2013, Ripjar says it serves more than 300 businesses, including large banks and corporations. The report was conducted on its behalf by Vitreous World.

The research focused on decision-makers responsible for screening and financial crime functions, meaning the responses reflect the views of senior executives rather than frontline compliance staff. That gives the findings weight as an indication of board-level priorities, but also underlines the disconnect between strategic intent and operational practice.

For banks under pressure to strengthen anti-money laundering controls, the figures suggest many still depend on labour-intensive processes in a risk area that leaders increasingly regard as essential. The combination of manual searches, incomplete continuous monitoring and partial AI deployment points to a market still in transition despite rising regulatory and financial pressure.