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From its first trailer, it was crystal clear that Apple was serious about making its blockbuster ode to car racing as realistic as possible. It was shot in and around an actual Formula One season. Legendary driver Lewis Hamilton was a producer and consultant. And Brad Pitts fictional F1 team had a large collection of very real brand partners and sponsors. One of if not the most visible is expense management software brand Expensify. Its on the car, its on the helmet, its emblazoned across Brad Pitts chest. Damson Idriss character actually shoots an Expensify commercial in the film. Idris also showed up to the Met Gala in the racing suit. This is 1,000-horsepower product placement. On this episode of Brand New World, I talk to Expensifys chief financial officer Ryan Schaffer, and Hannes Ciatti, founder and head creative at ad agency Alto, who give me a look under the hood of how the brand got such a prominent role in what is shaping up to be Apples first hit film. Schaffer says that the brand is almost omnipresent in the film by nature of its placement as a F1 sponsor, but that the level of exposure around the film was unexpected. Things like the Don Tolliver/Doja Cat music video, or the fact the Expensify logo pops up in every other brand sponsors promo materials, have made it already worth the investment. We have 20 companies right now promoting our logo. Other companies much larger than ours are promoting our logo, not on purpose, but we can’t help but be there by nature of this sponsorship. Heineken’s running a spot we’re in, and we’ve never spoken to them. [Photo: Apple] Industry debrief We recorded this episode in late June, as most of the advertising, marketing, and brand industry was fresh off the Cannes Lions Festival of Creativity. Thats where brands, marketers, ad agencies, tech companies, platforms, entertainment, sports, or anyone who is part of the brand world ecosystem lands in the South of France to celebrate the previous year and make deals for the months ahead. To make sense of it all, or at least a good portion of it, I called up Tim Nudd, the creativity editor at Advertising Age, and a journalist whos been covering and commenting on this industry for longer than almost anyone. Inside scoops, gossip, or just good stories, Nudd and I talked about what impressed him most, surprised him, and what hes hearing we can expect from major brands heading into the second half of the year. Check it out here, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Category:
E-Commerce
The flash floods that have devastated Texas are already a difficult crisis to manage. More than 100 people are confirmed dead after the July 4 deluge, and many more remain missing. But while recovery efforts are underway, Texas authorities are grappling with a compounding challenge: civilian drone operators interfering with emergency response. Amateur pilots are either trying to capture dramatic footage of the disaster or, in some cases, attempting to locate missing or stranded people themselves. Thats not just unhelpfulits dangerous. We know that people want to volunteer, but what we are starting to see is personal drones flying, Kerrville city manager Dalton Rice said at a recent press conference. Rice discouraged these have-a-go heroes with drones. These personal drones flying is a danger to aircraft, which then risks further operations, he added. What might seem like good intentions from above is, in practice, making things worse on the ground. Particularly with emergency response, people think that they’re doing good, when, in reality, they’re causing more harm than good, says Ryan Wallace, a professor and drone expert at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University. This isnt a new problem. In January 2025, a drone collided with one of two Super Scooper amphibious aircraft fighting the Los Angeles wildfires. The collision forced the aircraft to land and be decommissioned, instantly halving the regions firefighting capacity. Its a sad reality that people have been flying drones over disaster zones without permission ever since the technology came into widespread use over a decade ago, says Arthur Holland Michel, a drone expert and author of Eyes in the Sky. The growing availability of consumer drones over the past decade has worsened the issue. As drones became less expensive in the 2010s, more people had them for unregulated recreational use or professional photography, explains Robin Murphy, professor emeritus at Texas A&M University. She recalls how, during Hurricane Harvey in 2017, officials had to call the sheriff to stop a civilian trying to film flood footage to sell to the news, just so official drone teams could gather time-sensitive emergency data. Between 2015 and 2025, there have been 190 recorded instances of unmanned aircraft system (UAS) incursions, conflicts, or airspace intrusions that interfered with wildfire and U.S. Forest Service operations, according to Wallace. Despite repeated education campaigns, the message isnt sinking in. Aviation authorities have tried again and again to educate drone users about the very real risks of interfering with rescue efforts and disaster relief, but it just doesnt seem to get through to some people, Wallace says. While technical and legal options exist to disable unauthorized drones, the burden often falls on responders, who should be focused on saving lives and not policing airspace. The comparison, Murphy notes, is stark: Its like a civilian walking up to a SWAT team commander during an active shooter event and offering to help cover off an angle because they have a gun permit. There are so many problems with this, she says. The person doesnt have radios, doesnt know the parlance, isnt trained in SWAT, there are procedures for joining an agency, the agency would be liable for this persons actions, and so on. Same thing with self-deploying drones. Low-flying civilian drones also pose a collision risk to helicopters operating just above the ground to aid trapped residents. In crowded and chaotic airspace, the presence of rogue drones can quite literally turn deadly. Even when drone pilots arent disrupting emergency aircraft, their contributions often cant be used. The emergency managers usually can’t use the data because it is not verified, says Murphy. For example, agencies cant accept a report from a person claiming to be a civil engineer they have never met and without credentials who says a building is about to collapse; the agencies have a process for obtaining data according to accountability standards. The file formats from commercial drones also dont always align with agency tools. One colleague, Murphy recalls, spent 40 hours converting well-meaning footage from a civilian into a usable format after a fire. What is disturbing to me personally is the lack of enforcement or consequences, she adds. The agencies are in a no-win situation and cant do it; if they come down hard on self-deployed teamsassuming they had time during a response. As for why early warnings didnt prevent more loss of life during the Texas floods, some observers point to recent staffing cuts at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), which may have led to the early retirement of a key local meteorologist. The forecasting question may take time to answer, but the drone problem is already making itself known.
Category:
E-Commerce
Real estate investors are snapping up a bigger share of U.S. homes on the market as rising prices and stubbornly high borrowing costs freeze out many other would-be homebuyers.Nearly 27% of all homes sold in the first three months of the year were bought by investorsthe highest share in at least five years, according to a report by real estate data provider BatchData.Between 2020 and 2023, the share of homes bought by investors averaged 18.5%.All told, investors bought 265,000 homes in the January-March quarter, an increase of 1.2% from the same period a year earlier, the firm said.Despite the modest annual increase, the rise in the share of investor home purchases is more a reflection of how much the housing market has slowed as traditional buyers face growing affordability constraints, according to BatchData.The U.S. housing market has been in a sales slump since early 2022, when mortgage rates began to climb from pandemic-era lows. Home sales fell last year to their lowest level in nearly 30 years.They’ve remained sluggish so far this year, as many prospective homebuyers have been discouraged by elevated mortgage rates and home prices that have kept climbing, though more slowly.As home sales have slowed, properties are taking longer to sell. That’s led to a sharply higher inventory of homes on the market, benefitting investors and other home shoppers who can afford to bypass current mortgage rates by paying in cash or tapping home equity gains.“As traditional buyers struggle with affordability, investors with cash and financing advantages are stepping in to maintain transaction volume,” according to the report.BatchData analyzes U.S. home sales records to determine which properties were purchased by investors. These could include vacation homes or rentals, but not a homebuyer’s primary residence.Investors bought 1.2 million homes in 2024, up from an average of 1.1 million homes a year going back to 2020, according to BatchData.Even so, investor-owned homes account for roughly 20% of the nation’s 86 million single-family homes, the firm said.Of those, mom-and-pop investors, or those who own between 1 and 5 homes, account for 85% of all investor-owned residential properties, while those with between 6 and 10 properties account for another 5%.Institutional investors that own 1,000 or more homes account for only about 2.2% of all investor-owned homes, the firm said.And that number could get smaller, amid signs that large institutional investors are scaling back home purchases.Out of a group of eight of the biggest companies that own and lease single-family houses, including Invitation Homes and American Homes 4 Rent, six sold more homes in the second quarter than they bought, according to data from Parci Labs. Alex Veiga, AP Business Writer
Category:
E-Commerce
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