Thousands of technology, media, and advertising executives from around the globe are at the CES trade show this week in Las Vegas to network and conduct business surrounded by futuristic gadgets.
Some of those who work for Rupert Murdoch, executive chairman of both News Corp. and 21st Century Fox, also have a special event to attend: A private annual confab in Murdoch’s hotel suite featuring some of the biggest names in business, which started yesterday (Jan. 6) and concludes today.
This year’s speakers were scheduled to include Snapchat founder Evan Spiegel, Google CEO Sundar Pichai, the founders of news startup TheSkimm, Slack CEO Stewart Butterfield, venture capitalist/analyst-types Benedict Evans and Mary Meeker, actor and entrepreneur Jessica Alba, and Apple iTunes and cloud services executive Eddy Cue, according to an agenda viewed by Quartz and sources familiar with the event.
While many of these executives were likely to go to CES anyway—it has become a must-attend event for the digital media industry in addition to its original electronics focus—it’s impressive that News Corp. is able to put such a lineup together.
(It’s worth noting that Apple—at least publicly—has historically avoided CES, and again has no public presence here this year. And the News Corp.-owned Wall Street Journal also just launched on Snapchat’s “Discover” mobile-video service yesterday.)
The event, described by past participants, is for an internal audience of Murdoch’s News Corp. and 21st Century Fox lieutenants, and has historically been organized by News Corp. chief technology officer Paul Cheesbrough.
A News Corp. spokesperson confirmed the event, noting that Murdoch tweeted descriptively about it last year: