Started in 1967, the Consumer Electronics Show crisscrossed the calendar to cities and spots, eventually establishing itself as an annual January event in Las Vegas in 1998. For more than half of those years, the Variety Entertainment Summit has become a staple New Year’s tradition, bringing together leaders from a variety of media industries for on-stage discussions about how cutting-edge technology is transforming entertainment and shaping culture.
This year, Variety’s CES offering will consist of two parts, both held at Aria’s C-Space Studio. Variety Entertainment Summit on January 7th from 9am to 4:30pm and Variety Business of Creators Summit hosted by Samsung Ads on January 8th from 9am to 1pm.
Participants include everyone from Disney’s president of global advertising Rita Ferro and Hasbro’s president of licensing and entertainment Kim Boyd to actors Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Simon Helberg.
This year will bring even more urgency to the conversation brought on by the lightning emergence of AI, which many see as an existential threat.
But Jon Liebman, chairman and CEO of Brillstein Entertainment Partners, points out that AI is just the latest in a series of technology disruptors that would have spelled doom for the industry, from the advent of sound movies in the 1920s to home video in the 1980s to the Internet in the 1990s.
“I think Hollywood has been shouting that technology is going to destroy business, but in reality, the opposite is probably happening,” says Liebman, who will appear on the “Future of Content” panel moderated by Variety co-editor-in-chief Cynthia Littleton on January 7. “Technology has become a tool that we have today, the global distribution of content, if used properly. So I don’t think anyone really knows what it’s going to do for our society, but I think that any fears that we have in business need to be tempered by the reality of what technology has historically done for the entertainment business and what it’s done to drive the growth of the entertainment business over time.”
Liebman won’t face any pushback from Jonathan Junger, co-founder and CEO of the AI-powered content creation platform and Studio Arcana. Junger will be joined by actor and producer Breckin Mayer (who starred in Arcana’s AI short “Echo Hunters”) and Andrew Wallenstein, chief analyst and president of Luminate, in a conversation about AI storytelling on January 7th.
“(AI) toolsets can really make a difference and help you maintain or increase production value while reducing costs,” Junger said, adding, “AI cannot work without creatives and storytellers.”
Other panels at the Variety Entertainment Summit on January 7 include “The New Business of Entertainment,” moderated by Danny Ledger, Deloitte’s communications, media and entertainment consulting services leader; “Experience This! What’s Next in Events Across Platforms” and “Fandom in the Zeitgeist” are hosted by Variety Business Editor Todd Spangler. “AI Overdrive” and “Big Picture Perspectives – What Trends Shape 2026?” hosted by Littleton. There will also be a “Brand Maker Elite Roundtable” on “Leveraging Fandom through Live Sports Content Featuring Amazon Ads and WPP Media,” as well as a headline conversation with Anthony Wood, founder, chairman and CEO of Roku.
The Variety Business of Creators Summit on January 8th will feature panels such as “The State of the Creator Economy in Media and Entertainment.” “New Hollywood Power Players: The Rise of Creators on Television” and “The Power of Creator Brands,” hosted by Littleton. Spangler hosted “The Era of Live Shopping” and “Unleashing Your Audience — The Future of Creator Marketing,” as well as a fireside chat with “media cartographer” Evan Shapiro and Substack co-founder Hamish McKenzie.
