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Uber is turning trip and takeout data into insights for marketers

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Uber wants advertisers to level up their marketing by tapping into data on the millions of rides and deliveries its users order every day.

The ride-hailing giant is announcing the launch of a new insights platform called Uber Intelligence on Monday, the company exclusively told Business Insider.

Launched in partnership with the data-connectivity platform LiveRamp, Uber Intelligence will let advertisers securely combine their customer data with Uber’s to help surface insights about their audiences, based on what they eat and where they travel.

It uses LiveRamp’s clean room technology, which lets companies aggregate their data in a privacy-safe environment, without sharing or seeing each other’s raw or personally identifiable customer information.

A hotel brand could use Uber Intelligence to help identify which restaurants or entertainment venues it might want to partner with for its loyalty program, for example.

Uber also hopes the platform can act as a flywheel for its broader ad business. Marketers can use the data clean room for segmentation, such as identifying customers who are heavy business travelers, then targeting them with ads on their next trip to the airport in the Uber app or on screens inside Uber cars.

“That seamlessness is why we’re so excited,” Edwin Wong, global head of measurement at Uber Advertising, told Business Insider in an interview. He added that the aim is for marketers to begin saying, “‘Oh, I’m not just understanding Uber, I’m understanding Uber in my marketing context.'”

Uber’s other route to revenue

Uber Intelligence is the latest step in the evolution of Uber’s ad business. Uber officially launched its dedicated advertising division in 2022. It offers an array of ad formats in the Uber and Uber Eats apps, on in-car tablets, in emails to its users, and on car tops.

The company said in May that its ad business had reached a $1.5 billion revenue run rate — the figure it has projected to hit by the end of 2025 — which would represent a 60% increase on last year. The company doesn’t break out a more specific ad-revenue figure and hasn’t provided an update on the run-rate number since May.

Uber Intelligence forms part of a bespoke set of services it offers its top advertisers. Earlier this year, it launched a creative studio where brands can partner with Uber to deliver more bespoke campaigns, such as offering rides to Miami F1 Grand Prix attendees in a luxury vehicle sponsored by La Mer, packed with freebie skincare products.

Andrew Frank, analyst at the research firm Gartner, said the launch of Uber Intelligence is another signal that Uber’s ad business is maturing.

“Early-stage ad businesses tend to focus exclusively on selling inventory while more mature ones focus more on delivering differentiated value through targeting and measurement solutions that help brands understand and optimize the impact of their spend,” Frank told Business Insider.

Uber’s unique source of “terrestrial data” put it in good standing against the likes of Amazon, Google, and other retail media networks that emphasize the value of their data-driven insights, Frank added. However, he said Uber may need to address privacy concerns related to aggregating highly sensitive data in order to maintain consumer trust and to comply with evolving global regulators as a collector of first-party data.

Vihan Sharma, chief revenue officer of LiveRamp, said its platform provides technical guarantees to ensure “zero movement of data.”

“The whole objective of a clean room technology is to build trust between data owners and consumers and the advertising ecosystem,” Sharma said.




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A Ferrari and over 480 takeout orders: FBI details spending spree of Netflix director in $11 million fraud case

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In March of 2020, Netflix infused $11 million into a production company to complete the first season of “White Horse,” a futuristic sci-fi series it hoped to bring to its platform.

Carl Rinsch — the director, writer, and showrunner of “White Horse” — never finished the 12 episodes he was supposed to deliver.

But a short time after he got the cash, Rinsch spent millions of dollars on furniture, cars, credit card bills —  and a whole lot of takeout.

According to testimony at his criminal trial on Thursday, Rinsch spent a total of $9.14 million through a personal bank account with funds originally earmarked to finish “White Horse,” which had the production codename “Conquest.”

The spending included more than 480 food deliveries from Postmates and Uber Eats during a six-month span in 2022, according to a spreadsheet entered into evidence. The spreadsheet showed Rinsch sometimes making a dozen separate food purchases each day.

The most expensive category, FBI agent Michael Naccarelli testified, was for furniture, for which Rinsch spent $3.36 million.

Rinsch also spent $2.4 million on cars — including a Ferrari and Rolls-Royces — and $1.8 million on American Express bills, according to Naccarelli. He also spent money on hotels, jewelry, and art, Naccarelli said.

“Rinsch described the Ferrari as “a birthday gift to myself” in a 2021 text message to his personal assistant, which was shown to jurors later Thursday.

Attorneys for Rinsch told jurors at his trial in Manhattan federal court that the “White Horse” debacle is a civil business dispute — not criminal financial fraud.

They say Rinsch, who previously directed “47 Ronin,” starring Keanu Reeves, is a “creative genius” who was overwhelmed by the demands of directing, writing, and producing “White Horse” and left to flounder by the streaming company.

Days after Netflix sent $11 million to a bank account for Rinsch’s production company, he moved $10.5 million to a personal Wells Fargo bank account, according to Naccarelli and records entered into trial evidence.

The director then moved portions of the funds to a Kraken cryptocurrency exchange account, as well as other bank accounts, before ultimately transferring $13.7 million to a personal Bank of America account.

With his Kraken account, Rinsch purchased about a dozen different cryptocurrencies, including Dogecoin, Etherium, Bitcoin Cash, and the stablecoin Tether, trial records show.

In April 2022, Rinsch’s Dogecoin holdings were worth about $755,000, and his Etherium tokens about $939,000, according to Naccarelli.

While a financial advisor previously testified in the trial that Rinsch’s stock investments went badly, Naccarelli said the director’s cryptocurrency investments were profitable.

“The trades performed very well,” Naccarelli said as Rinsch — wearing a three-piece black suit and a patterned pink tie and matching pocket square — nodded slightly.

Allen Grove, an FBI agent who testified after Naccarelli, said Rinsch considered himself a major Dogecoin trader when they met in April 2023 regarding a dispute over one of Rinsch’s furniture purchases in Paris.

“Mr. Rinsch described to me that he became wealthy during the pandemic by investing in Dogecoin,” Grove testified. “He described himself to me as ‘The Dogecoin Whale.'”

Rinsch said in an earlier deposition, which was shown to jurors on Thursday, that his purchases of four Rolls-Royces were meant for the production of “White Horse,” and not for personal use. Netflix wrote off the production as a loss in 2020.

“That would be fraud otherwise,” Rinsch said in the deposition.




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