Brian Handrigan
Co-Founder, NEXT90
26 years building the infrastructure to represent advertising reality.
Why truth matters
I've spent 26 years watching the advertising industry argue about credit instead of asking what actually happened. That argument wastes money, erodes trust, and produces worse outcomes for everyone — advertisers, agencies, and publishers alike.
NEXT90 exists because I believe every advertising decision should be based on reality. Not on what a platform claims. Not on what a model estimates. On what actually happened — verified by context, geography, and time.
That commitment to truth is the foundation of the Insights & Data Engine, and it's the standard everything we build gets held to.
The path here
The pattern was visible early. In 2000, server logs showed that TV ads drove web traffic — but there was no way to prove the connection at scale. Every step since has been about building the infrastructure to close that gap.
Along the way: patents in cross-media detection and conversion tracking. The VEIL signal detection portfolio. Kantar's ad verification unit. Contribution to the MRC Outcomes and Data Quality Standards alongside Nielsen, Disney, FOX, and Oracle. Published work in Forbes arguing that TV and digital need each other — not to fight over credit.
In 2021, The Drum asked me about Google's Privacy Sandbox. I called it a "wolf in sheep's clothing." Google never killed the cookie.
None of this happened alone. My co-founder Randy Cairns and I have been friends and professional collaborators for over 20 years. He was one of the first clients to test cross-media ideas back in the early 2000s — he saw the vision from the other side of the table. Two decades later, we're still building it together. His operational instincts and my technical obsession are what make NEXT90 work.
Published work
Forbes Agency Council
- “TV And Digital Advertising Need To Stop Fighting” (January 2019)
- “Direct-To-Consumer Brands Are Starting To Face Traditional Media Issues” (June 2019)
- “How Can Political Advertisers Run More Inclusive Digital Campaigns?” (July 2019)
- “If Data Is The New Oil, Why Are So Many Advertisers Squandering It?” (November 2020)
MRC
- Contributing organization to Outcomes and Data Quality Standards (September 2022)
Press & Media
- “Traaqr Connects Your Online Identity With Your Real One” TechCrunch (October 2017)
- “Avocados From Mexico Links Search To TV, Site Traffic Soars” MediaPost (February 2019)
- “How Google's New-Found Love of Privacy Impacts Adtech” The Drum (March 2021)
- “Advocado Buys Kantar Ad Verification Unit, Creating Data, Attribution Platform” Next TV (Broadcasting+Cable) (December 2021)
- “Ad-tech Firm Advocado Raises $10 Million” St. Louis Post-Dispatch (December 2021)
- “Software Startup Cracks Code for Providing Online Data to Offline Sellers” St. Louis Post-Dispatch (October 2017)
Podcasts
- The InFOCUS Podcast Radio & Television Business Report
- UpTech Report Alexander Ferguson
- VBOUT V-Cast VBOUT
Conferences & speaking
- TechCrunch Disrupt SF Product launch (Traaqr) 2017
- LeadsCon Las Vegas Speaker — Small Data & Offline Conversions 2018
- NYC Television Week Speaker/Panelist 2019
- Media Ad Sales Summit Panelist — Reinventing Measurement & Outcomes 2022
- PDMI East Speaker 2022
- DMEXCO Cologne Exhibitor 2023
Recognition
- Inc. 5000 Rank #556 — 1,056% three-year revenue growth (2023)
- Pipeline Entrepreneurs Inspiration Award (2019)
- LendingTree Startup Innovation Spotlight Finalist LeadsCon Connect to Convert (2017)
Patents
Named inventor on 8 patents spanning television-to-digital website traffic tracking, online-to-offline conversion tracking, intelligent call routing, signal encoding, and co-browsing technology.
- EP3701474A1 / WO2019083848A1 — Website Traffic Tracking System (television-to-digital)
- US12045853B2 — Methods and Systems for Online to Offline Conversion Tracking
- US11790394B2 — Automatic Call Routing Using Anonymous Online User Behavior
- US9256691B2 — Internet Co-Browsing Systems
The full NEXT90/affiliate patent portfolio includes 50+ patents in cross-media detection, audio/video watermarking, conversion tracking, and signal processing.