Ex-Pinterest Marketer Andréa Mallard Named Microsoft AI CMO

Microsoft AI (MAI) has named Andréa Mallard as chief marketing officer (CMO).

The exec, who left Pinterest in January after seven years, confirmed her new role in a LinkedIn post.

“Just under two weeks ago, I began my new role as CMO for Microsoft AI,” she wrote. “AI is already the most consequential technological shift of my lifetime. It will shape our children’s lives in ways that are difficult to predict.”

She continued: “That’s precisely why I’ve joined profoundly thoughtful leaders like Mustafa Suleyman, Yusuf Mehdi, Jacob Andreou, Mike Davidson, Julia Beizer, Ciaran McCarthy, Charles Kha, Mark D’Arcy, and David Levenson (among many others I’ve yet to meet) to help build a technology that truly earns the trust needed to serve human potential.”

ADWEEK has reached out to Microsoft for further details on Mallard’s hire.

MAI is Microsoft’s dedicated AI research lab, established in 2024. It’s led by DeepMind co-founder Suleyman as CEO.

In late 2025, MAI unveiled new branding and a website showcasing its core tools and products, which include its LLM companion Copilot, AI-powered search engine Bing, its Edge browser, and communication platform GroupMe.

Mallard’s appointment comes as the legacy tech giant ramps up its AI ambitions. It has already committed billions to OpenAI, embedding the newcomer’s models across Co-Pilot, Bing, and cloud-computing platform Azure.

It also comes as AI brands continue to snap up senior marketing talent, including chipmaker Nvidia’s recent hire of longtime Google executive Alison Wagonfeld as its first-ever CMO.

A pin-worthy legacy

During her tenure at Pinterest as global CMO, ADWEEK Brand Genius honoree Mallard expanded her remit to include external communications.

She built Pinterest’s global marketing function from scratch, steering the brand through its 2019 IPO and the COVID-19 pandemic.

Mallard also helped reposition Pinterest as a positive, inspiration-led alternative to traditional social media feeds through its marketing, and launched tentpole initiatives, including its yearly Pinterest Predicts trends report and flagship advertiser showcase, Pinterest Presents.

These efforts resulted in Pinterest sharpening its cultural relevance among Gen Z, growing advertiser appeal, and scaling to reach 600 million monthly users.

Now, Pinterest has hired Claudine Cheever as CMO. She was most recently vp of global brand and marketing at Amazon, where she worked for nearly a decade.