Codes of Culture | Issue 107
Can Gucci’s F1 sponsorship bring back the luxury customers?
Welcome back to Codes of Culture. I’m Ashumi Sanghvi.
End of a brilliant first day hosting some of India’s most brilliant tech founders in partnership with Startup Policy Forum India. We had posted the announcement here.
On my radar this week, a post on LinkedIn peaked my interest in the cultural mood matrix, where we are in proximity to the tech overlords, which defines our general mood.
Also, Gucci confirmed its F1 sponsorship with Alpine, which we shared in the last issue and more details below. Can luxury brand sponsorships across media, sport, and entertainment bring back any of the 50 million customers lost?
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📖In this issue:
Ferrari’s first EV arrived at near-universal rejection.
NASA says its Artemis moon base will cover hundreds of square miles.
Brain-sensing tech is moving into consumer wearables.
SOND is turning sleep tech into a closed-loop system.
Gucci is making Formula 1 a primary brand platform.
1. LUXURY AND THE IDENTITY QUESTION
Ferrari's first EV arrived at near-universal rejection.
What’s happening: Ferrari revealed the Luce, a five-seat electric vehicle priced at around $650,000 and designed by LoveFrom, the studio of Jony Ive and Marc Newson. The car delivers 1,000 horsepower and reaches 60 miles per hour in just over two seconds, but the design drew immediate backlash, and Ferrari’s stock fell on the day of the reveal. Ferrari’s own marketing leadership described the car as deliberately polarising. The more important point is who it is for: not Ferrari’s existing owner base, more than 80% of whom already own another Ferrari, but a different customer entirely, with China clearly in view.
TLDR:
Ferrari did not design this for its current owner base. That is the story.
LoveFrom brings cultural prestige, but the result has landed as estrangement rather than evolution.
Ferrari needs an EV strategy for regulatory reasons, even if the first move creates visible brand friction.
China appears to be the real target market, not Europe or the US.
The risk is simple: the extension weakens the core before the new audience arrives.
Why it matters: The Luce raises the identity question every heritage brand is now facing: how do you enter a new technology category without dismantling the value that made the brand worth extending in the first place? Ferrari is trying to address regulation, geography, and generational change in a single product. Whether that works will matter well beyond the automotive industry.
2. SPACE INFRASTRUCTURE AND SOVEREIGNTY
NASA says its Artemis moon base will cover hundreds of square miles.
What’s happening: NASA has laid out a lunar south pole base that will span hundreds of square miles, using hopping drones, autonomous rovers, delivery systems, and distributed infrastructure rather than a single, concentrated outpost. Contracts worth more than $700 million have been awarded across lunar vehicles, deliveries, and perimeter-mapping systems, with phased development running through 2032. The scale reflects the mission: science, habitation, power generation, mobility, and permanent presence cannot all sit in one place. China is pursuing the same territory on a similar timeline.
TLDR:
This is not just a moon mission. It is an infrastructure plan.
The footprint is large because the south pole is operationally fragmented by design.
Hopping drones and rovers will define the territory before humans do.
The competition is not symbolic; it is logistical and geopolitical.
The lunar south pole is becoming the most strategic address off-planet.
Why it matters: This is the clearest sign yet that the lunar economy is being framed like terrestrial infrastructure: multi-vendor, phased, redundant, and politically strategic. The more consequential question is not whether the moon becomes commercial. It is who writes the norms around access, control, and presence before the legal architecture catches up.
3. FRONTIER TECH AND THE BODY
Brain wearables are moving into the consumer market.
What’s happening: Neurable, a Boston-based brain-computer interface startup, is licensing its non-invasive EEG technology to consumer hardware makers across health, gaming, and productivity rather than trying to win the device market itself. The company has already shipped a prototype headset with HyperX and is now positioning its brain-sensing layer for integration into headphones, glasses, and headbands. That move comes as the broader brain health wearable category is projected to grow from $2.9 billion in 2024 to $15 billion by 2035, with smart EEG devices outpacing the wider BCI market. The shift is subtle but important: brain-computer interface is moving out of the lab and into the logic of consumer electronics.
TLDR:
Neurable is not building the breakout product; it is building the layer inside it.
EEG is moving into familiar form factors: headphones, glasses, and headbands.
The category is now being framed as a consumer wearable market, not just a clinical or research one.
Smart EEG devices are projected to outgrow the broader BCI segment.
The commercial question is no longer whether this works, but who controls the experience around it.
Why it matters: Wearables have already normalised continuous tracking of the body. Brain wearables push that one layer further, toward constant measurement of cognitive state, attention, and mental recovery. The important shift is not only technical. It is commercial. Once neural sensing starts appearing inside everyday devices, the companies that matter most may be the ones that define the meaning, utility, and trust layer around the data.
4. WELLNESS, HARDWARE AND THE SLEEP STACK
SOND is turning sleep tech into a closed-loop system.
What’s happening: SOND, a Boston startup founded by Bose’s former head of sleep products, has emerged from stealth with $7 million in funding and a debut product called Dreambuds. The in-ear system captures 12 physiological signals, including respiration, heart rate variability, sleep staging, body position, and snoring, then uses a cloud-based AI sleep coach to adapt audio interventions in real time. The device runs without requiring a phone, with Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and voice interaction built into the charging case. The proposition is not passive sleep audio, but a responsive sleep system designed to sense, interpret, and act.
TLDR:
SOND is not selling earbuds in the usual sense. It is selling a closed-loop sleep platform.
The signal is the stack: sensors, AI coaching, audio intervention, and hardware all working together.
Removing the phone from the experience is part of the product logic, not a design flourish.
Sleep tech is shifting from tracking and masking to intervention.
The category is moving closer to healthcare architecture while still being sold through consumer hardware.
Why it matters: Sleep has become one of the clearest examples of wellness moving from content into infrastructure. The companies that matter now are not just producing better audio or nicer hardware, but also systems that can continuously measure the body and respond in real time. That pushes sleep tech into a more serious category, somewhere between a consumer device, a behavioural platform, and a preventive health layer.
5. LUXURY, SPORT AND CULTURAL INFRASTRUCTURE
Gucci is making Formula 1 a primary brand platform.
What’s happening: As we shared in Issue 105, the potential for Gucci to sponsor Alpine F1 has now been confirmed. Starting with the 2027 season, Gucci will become the title partner of Renault’s Alpine Formula One team, which will be rebranded as the Gucci Racing Alpine Formula One Team. Reuters reports this is the first time a high-fashion house will lend its name to an F1 team, while coverage around the launch describes Gucci Racing as a broader platform spanning content, product, and client experiences rather than a standard logo-placement deal.
TLDR:
This is no longer speculation. Gucci has formally entered Formula 1 through Alpine.
The move turns Formula 1 into a long-term luxury platform, not a media buy.
Gucci Racing signals a broader commercial and cultural build, across content, product, and experience.
Alpine offers a team identity that is still shapeable, which matters more than buying into an overbuilt property.
The sport’s value to luxury now sits in recurring global attention, not just hospitality or sponsorship visibility.
Why it matters: Formula 1 has become one of the few global environments where a luxury brand can build its identity across media, geographies, live experiences, and products simultaneously. Gucci’s move confirms what was already becoming clear: the sport is no longer adjacent to fashion and luxury; it is becoming one of their most effective operating stages. The brands arriving now are not simply buying exposure. They are buying a position inside a platform that still has room to be defined.