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- [00:00]
Amit Verma
This podcast is sponsored by Comcast Business. When business leaders struggle to get measurable value out of artificial intelligence, it's often because they're operating AI on top of disjointed architectures, says Amit Verma, chief technology officer at Comcast Business.
- [00:14]
Comcast Business Representative
That's why we make sure AI works with a connectivity fabric that permanently links people, applications, data and machines everywhere and all the time.
- [00:24]
Amit Verma
That's continuous intelligence. Later, he'll explain why it can bring cohesion to AI deployments.
- [00:34]
Luke Vargas
The Pentagon tries to drum up support on Capitol Hill for $80 billion more to fund the Iran war plus say hello to nine figure pay packages as CEO compensation soars.
- [00:46]
Teo Francis
There were more CEOs making over $100 million than any time since 2021. Almost a dozen CEOs were over 200 million.
- [00:56]
Luke Vargas
And to build more homes in the U.S. do we need to rethink how they're built? It's Tuesday, June 23rd. I'm Luke Vargas for the Wall Street Journal and here is the AM edition of what's news, the top headlines and business stories moving your world today. We begin with a tech fueled market sell off that's extending into a second day and spreading overseas invest. Investors concerned about the cost of AI are taking stock while also weighing the continued downturn in SpaceX shares since its blockbuster IPO 10 days ago. This morning, Asian markets closed lower after South Korea's Kospi tumbled 10% on losses in major chip makers including Samsung. European tech stocks are also dragging down markets there, with Europe's most valuable company, ASML, retreating 5%. And futures indicate that US stock markets are in for another down day as well, with Alphabet, Nvidia and Oracle all falling sharply in premarket trading. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth is urging lawmakers to commit more funding for the Iran war even as talks continue to reach a concrete deal to end the conflict. We reported last week that the Pentagon is seeking $80 billion in supplemental funding, though a formal funding request hasn't yet been sent to Congress. The fresh funding push comes as lawmakers have been voicing skepticism about the terms of the deal to end the war. The fresh funding push comes as lawmakers have been voicing skepticism about the terms of the deal to end the war and are pushing the Trump administration for a comprehensive price tag for the conflict. Last month, Hegseth told Congress that the war had cost $29 billion. ABC is taking its fight with the Federal Communications Commission to its own airwaves starting yesterday, the BROADC network began urging viewers to weigh in against the FCC's early review of its broadcast licenses and a separate probe of its daily talk show the View, using ads like this one on Chicago's ABC7 to steer its audience toward an FCC public comment page.
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Nicole Friedman
ABC7 has proudly served you for more than 70 years. Every day we commit to inform, entertain and serve you. Now the FCC is questioning our commitment to the community.
- [03:19]
Luke Vargas
ABC says that both FCC probes threaten free speech. Meanwhile, an FCC representative called the TV spots part of a campaign of misinformation. And late yesterday, FCC Chairman Brendan Carr posted a link on X encouraging people to submit comments about the View. It's Tuesday, so it must be primary day somewhere. And in fact it is in Maryland, Utah, New York and South Carolina, with the latter two states attracting the most attention. Around New York City, Mayor Zoran Mamdani is weighing in on several competitive House primaries, endorsing a pair of Democrats taking on incumbents. It's part of his campaign to remake the Democratic Party by backing candidates he said will deliver material change for working people. And in South Carolina, two Trump backed Republicans are going head to head in a gubernatorial runoff. Trump initially endorsed Lt. Gov. Pamela Evitt in the race, but on Friday said he'd endorse both her and Attorney General Allen Wilson, who's held a steady lead in opinion polls. Have key results for you on tomorrow's show. And just a year after nine figure pay packages seem to be fading for chief executives, the $100 million plus CEO salary is back with a bang. In the Journal's annual CEO pay ranking, we found that more U.S. cEOs crossed the once rare pay threshold in 2025 than in any year since 2021. And Journal special writer Teo Francis, who covers executive pay, said that nearly a dozen executives even topped 200 million.
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Teo Francis
It isn't just Elon Musk, but he and Tesla may be setting the tone. The last time we saw a surge in nine figure pay packages, it seemed like it was a reaction to his first multibillion dollar pay deal. But we're also seeing the number of CEOs at the low end under $10 million continue to decline in pay packages under 100 million, but over 50 million. Those are getting more common too. The best performing companies aren't always the ones paying their CEOs the most, and the highest paid CEOs aren't necessari ones running the best performing companies. That said, I've been covering CEO pay for a long time and so far pay just keeps rising. There's still an open question whether rising pay helps shareholders. Research is beginning to suggest that these moonshot paydays, the hundred million dollar ones and bigger, don't generally help shareholders or pay off for executives.
- [05:45]
Luke Vargas
And for a rundown on some of the top paid CEOs, check out the link we've left in our show Notes Coming up To tackle America's housing shortage, do we need to rethink the house? From new designs to new materials, or even shifting construction off site? We'll look at the outside of the box approaches that some developers are turning to to get more built. Stick around after the break.
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Comcast Business Representative
Continuous intelligence has the ability to keep insights moving, turning signals into decisions and decisions into actions without losing context, momentum or trust.
- [06:21]
Amit Verma
That's CTO at Comcast Business, Amit Verma. He believes continuous intelligence and operating posture linking people, applications, data and machines is critical for AI success.
- [06:30]
Comcast Business Representative
It's important to have an integrated system that can power AI workflows with a flexible connectivity fabric and machine speed. Threat intelligence.
- [06:43]
Luke Vargas
To tackle the U.S. housing shortage, a Goldman Sachs report last year concluded Start with fixing zoning. We talked about that in the first installment of our housing series. But with the construction industry facing a major shortage of skilled workers, Goldman made it clear that zoning challenges are just the first hurdle facing builders, a trend on full display on both sides of the Atlantic. Labour's a big challenge Labour shortages in
- [07:11]
UK Construction Industry Expert 1
the UK are a concern.
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UK Construction Industry Expert 2
Getting skilled labour, like brickies for instance, is really difficult.
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Luke Vargas
Touring the UK Construction Week and future build conferences last month, it's clear that the industry is trying to adapt to worker shortages by rethinking how things are built, especially by embracing modular construction. Imagine assembling everything from concrete floors to wall segments far away from where projects eventually go up in a bid to make the job more attractive.
- [07:41]
UK Construction Industry Expert 2
So we have teams of skilled brickies in our factory environment it controlled temperature, no rain, etc as opposed to doing it 15 stories up in the driving rain on a building site somewhere in the winter.
- [07:53]
UK Construction Industry Expert 1
You know, we can give somebody close to where they live good, steady income in a really nice environment, consistency of work, not transient, not living away from home, which is a big problem in the construction industry in the uk.
- [08:07]
Luke Vargas
Modular homes aren't new and they can introduce their own quality or aesthetic issues. But with lengthy building times making many traditional projects more expensive and forcing developers to pass on costs to already strapped consumers, maybe a rethink of what housing looks like and how it's built is in order Both in the UK and beyond.
- [08:28]
UK Construction Industry Expert 2
30 stories and we did it in 36 weeks.
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Luke Vargas
You might look at being weathertight within eight weeks instead of 20 weeks. So it's a great solution for customers, particularly when building at scale. The overall project itself will probably save at least 40, 50%. You've got all the prelim costs on site. So for instance, toilet facilities, canteen facilities, security. The shorter that life cycle of that site, the cheaper it is for the builder to build. So could some creativity around what a home looks like or how it's built be what's needed to solve the U.S. housing shortage? Journal reporter Nicole Friedman covers the U.S. housing market and home building industries for us. Nicole, with this flood of new ideas out there, I wanted to ask you sort of which construction related innovations are actually worth paying attention to. Have you found anything that kind of hits that sweet spot? I mean, that's the center of the Venn diagram that pretty much everyone, I guess, whether you're building multifamily or single family homes, would be, would be wanting to unlock.
- [09:27]
Nicole Friedman
Yeah, there are lots of technologies that people are experimenting with, are using on small scale. I think we have yet to see any new emerging technology really kind of catch on in terms of making a huge change to the industry and being widely adopted. But that's not to say that that couldn't happen in the coming years. I think it's just still an era of experimentation and figuring out how to apply these technologies. And the truth is, a lot of large builders are super efficient already. Even though they're using more traditional techniques, they have the economies of scale. They have the ability to really kind of go from one site to another very quickly and use the same labor force across a large construction site. And so to really beat that level of efficiency, you know, a new technology really has to prove itself over time.
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Luke Vargas
You know, this sort of modularity, Nicole, often comes up in the context of multi family homes, big developments. And yet, you know, when I was out in the Bay Area recently, there's a number of 3D printing homes, startups that are kind of trying to say this is the future. And yet could that not introduce its own issues if construction is no longer boards and nails?
- [10:39]
Nicole Friedman
Yeah, I think with any of these new technologies, you know, a potential issue is what happens when something goes wrong and how do you fix it? Who do I call? Is there even a repair person who knows how to fix this issue? When the construction of the house is so innovative and new? And so definitely these technologies, we haven't necessarily seen how they hold up in the coming decades. Ideally, a home, you want to be standing in good condition for many, many years to come.
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Luke Vargas
I imagine Some of these sort of rethinks of the wheel of housing, so to speak, maybe come with their own potential drawbacks.
- [11:12]
Nicole Friedman
Well, I think it's really just a question of upfront cost and then there are questions of what the end user wants. You know, if these buildings look different than traditional buildings or they operate differently, you know, is that going to appeal to homeowners or to renters? So often we're seeing new technologies be adopted in scenarios like after a natural disaster, where there's a huge need to rebuild in fast way all at once, where there's typically a labor shortage and a material shortage because there's been a lot of destruction. That's when we tend to see a lot of innovation and creativity because there's just such a big need.
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Luke Vargas
Nicole? I guess so. Just beyond those disaster ridden environments though, you know, you have housing consumers that are maybe a bit choosier. And that is where I imagine there's maybe a bit of a rethink going on in the industry given present economic circumstance for so many people.
- [12:06]
Nicole Friedman
Well, definitely housing affordability is a huge challenge right now. You know, home prices are near record highs. Mortgage rates have been high for several years now. And so buyers are largely on the sidelines. They're not even willing to buy at this current price and rate level. And the ones who are in the market are typically being picky. And so if a developer is offering something that's maybe untested or a more unusual product, that could cause some of these buyers to think twice.
- [12:36]
Luke Vargas
Even if, let's say, you know, losing the formal dining room helps get square footage down to a price point where people might actually be able to close a sale.
- [12:45]
Nicole Friedman
In this environment where the affordability is really poor, it's very difficult to convince buyers to kind of make that purchase. I think developers are a little bit more willing to try new things or take chances or find ways to bring that cost down. And we are seeing that builders are building smaller homes. They're trying to take out features maybe like a traditional dining room that can kind of keep the home smaller and keep it more affordable for that consumer. And so definitely maybe experimenting, you know, with alternate building techniques or alternate materials is another way to that they can hope to appeal to that cost conscious buyer. Right now, you know, a home purchase, it is an investment, but it's so much more than that. You know, it's really, it's your home, it's where you're going to live. For many people, where they want to raise their families or retire or get married and so this is much more a lifestyle decision, an emotional decision, and money is a big part of it, but it is definitely not the only consideration.
- [13:46]
Luke Vargas
That was US Housing reporter Nicole Friedman. For more from her and on new construction forms, check out today's yous Money Briefing podcast. And tomorrow our housing series rolls on on the PM episode of what's News, looking at the federal efforts to solve the housing crisis. And if you have questions about that affordability or the new ways of building we discussed today, then send a voice memo to wnpodsj.com or leave a voicemail with your name and location at 212-416-4328. We'll be putting your most burning questions to Journal Real Estate Editor Craig Carman at the end of the week. And that's it for what's news for this Tuesday morning. Today's show was produced by Daniel Bach and Hattie Moyer. Our supervising producer is Sandra Kilhoff, and I'm Luke Vargas for the Wall Street Journal. We will be back tonight with a new show. Until then, thanks for listening. Foreign.
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Amit Verma
To develop continuous intelligence, enterprises must address technical debt from legacy systems, cross functional misalignment, data security and data quality. As Comcast Business CTO Amit Verman notes, it's not easy.
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Comcast Business Representative
AI agents generate a lot of data and they need low latency for inference. So the biggest challenge is having a robot robust infrastructure where you can pass data between agents and your large language models at a low latency speed so you're not slowing things down.
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Amit Verma
As leaders create an environment for data to move seamlessly, they must also manage risk.
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Comcast Business Representative
Governance must be built into orchestration workflows and AI systems. From this chart, guardrails, auditability and the clear ownership of data and tools need to be developed.
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Amit Verma
Visit comcastbusiness.comenterprise to learn how Comcast Business helps enterprises navigate an ever changing technology landscape.
- [15:40]
Nicole Friedman
This content was created by custom content from WSJ, a unit of the Wall Street Journal Advertising department.