SAN FRANCISCO—More than a dozen of the industry’s leading proponents of digital and social media and pioneers in the realm of data and analytics have signed on to sponsor The Holmes Report’s first In2 Summit, which will take place at San Francisco’s Four Seasons Hotel in January of next year and will focus on “Charting the Future of Engagement.”

Event sponsors include two Platinum-level partners, Hill+Knowlton Strategies and W2O Group, as well as industry leaders such as Allison + Partners, M Booth, Brodeur, Brunswick, ChandlerChicco Companies, Grayling, Havas PR, The Hoffman Agency, Horn, Inner Circle Labs, PMK•BNC, Revive Health, Ruder Finn, Text 100, Porter Novelli, Waggener Edstrom and the Zeno Group. The sponsors include specialists in technology and healthcare public relations, financial communications, digital and social media, as well as consumer lifestyle agencies with strong content creation capabilities.

“The scope, structure, language—indeed, the very definition—of public relations is changing,” says Paul Holmes, editor of The Holmes Report. “Today’s communications professionals need an understanding of big data and analytics, social media and community management; the ability to create content across multiple platforms and channels; and to tell authentic brand stories to consumers and other critical audiences. That’s what we are going to deliver at this event.”

In conjunction with the conference, the Holmes Report is launching a new brand, In2 (INsight+INnovation) that will include a blog, a list of the industry’s most innovative thinkers, and an expansion of the SABRE Awards competition focused on content creation and industry thought leadership.

The In2 initiative is being led by Aarti Shah, The Holmes Report’s west coast-based senior editor.

"The PR industry has been disrupted over the last decade, but amid this, a new way of thinking has surfaced across brands, agencies and professionals that are on the forefront of innovation,” says Shah.  The In2 brand, and our summit in San Francisco, will bring these voices together to set the agenda for the next evolution of engagement."