Few, if any, institutions were unaffected by the global pandemic, and the impact could certainly be seen in the media world. All major conferences and in-person events were suddenly canceled in what seemed like the blink of an eye, affecting how tech companies and the media outlets that covered them channeled enterprise content.

For more than a decade, SiliconANGLE Media and theCUBE, its livestreaming video platform, have been covering the enterprise space through a combination of live events and in-studio interviews with top technology executives, combined with an around-the-clock online news service and research arm. With the cancellation of live events in early 2020, theCUBE continued its coverage by leveraging its CUBE365 digital content platform, and it will take another step forward in the virtual evolution with the launch of a new quarterly series of theCUBE on Cloud events, the next being the AWS Startup Showcase: Innovations with CloudData & CloudOps.

“We’re going to be featuring 10 of the hottest cloud startups, all around data and machine learning,” said John Furrier (pictured, left), co-host of theCUBE. “We’ll unpack their competitive advantage and how they are going to be successful in the enterprise, in cloud.”

The first edition of the Startup Showcase will be broadcast on Wednesday, March 24, starting at 9 a.m. PDT, and will feature an opening panel of industry experts and thought leaders, including Jeff Barr, vice president and chief evangelist at Amazon Web Services Inc.; Jerry Chen, partner at Greylock; and Michael Liebow, cloud platform leader at McKinsey and Co. The event will conclude with a panel discussion on Innovation in Cloud-Scale Data that includes practitioner Ben Haynes; Underscore VC’s Michael Skok; and AWS’ Mike Feinstein. (* Disclosure below.)

Here’s Furrier’s discussion of the event with Dave Vellante (right), co-host of theCUBE, in the first of two videos:

Engagement and interaction

This latest series from theCUBE and SiliconANGLE is part of an evolving media landscape, as communication and engagement become more of a two-way street.

“A lot of companies are looking at events in a very narrow sense; do a large event, and then it’s on to the next one, so it’s all about this event cadence,” Vellante said. “Our philosophy is different. We really try to connect, build that community out, and then also bring that community back in. If you participate in a community event, in the next one you’re actually going to be featured; you’re going to come on theCUBE; you’re going to be participating in the program directly.”

The dramatic increase in virtual events, driven out of necessity by the pandemic, has led to a greater realization among businesses that new approaches to getting the message out would be required. This is also driving theCUBE’s initiative as it launches the new, interactive series.

“The bottom line is that every company has to be, in some way, shape or form, a media company,” Vellante said. “Everyone wants to control the narrative, control the audience, and the way you do that is produce great, authentic content. Most companies in the tech business aren’t really that good at it, and what we want to do is help them do that, give them tools, platforms and methodologies to be able to do that in an agile fashion.”

In addition to the companies hosting virtual events, sponsors are also looking for ways to make direct connections with a targeted virtual audience.

“If a sponsor is going to do that, they need to have media capabilities, not just event software,” Furrier noted. “We can help our sponsors with a product that goes directly to their customer, while we at the same time increase serving our audiences with high-quality content so they can consume or create with us. That is a flywheel of innovation; it is what media should be.”

Here’s the second of the two videos. (* Disclosure: TheCUBE is a paid media partner for the AWS Startup Showcase: Innovations With Cloud Data. Neither Amazon Web Services Inc. nor other sponsors have editorial control over content on theCUBE or SiliconANGLE.)

Photo: SiliconANGLE